Donate Bitcoin

Donate Paypal


PeakOil is You

PeakOil is You

LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

How to save energy through both societal and individual actions.

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby furrybill » Tue 15 Mar 2016, 09:26:37

kublikhan wrote:We had mixed results with our CFLs and LED bulbs. Some lights worked fine for years others had bulbs die every few months. We decided to replace the problem lights with LED fixtures, no bulbs to change. I'm hoping these will last longer. If not, I may have to try these:

Here’s a great way to lower your electric bills, and still have all the ultra-bright light bulbs you want operating 24 hours a day! Innovative new light bulbs called P-Bulbs give out bright, steady light – yet use no electricity. P-Bulbs look like compact fluorescent light bulbs, but instead of using electricity to make the gas glow inside, they use depleted plutonium from an atomic power plant. That means with P-Bulbs, not only do you get all the light you want for free, but you’ll be helping the atomic energy industry dispose of its used fuel! How green can you get? P-Bulbs come in 100, 200, 400, 1,000 and 5,000-watt sizes – choose the brightness that’s right for you. You can have as many P-Bulbs as you want operating all night and all day long! That’s because they can’t be turned off – the plutonium is always active. Imagine never having to remember to turn the light off when you leave a room. Imagine having all the light you ever wanted, with no dark rooms – even your attic and basement can be brilliantly lit at all times. Imagine the amazing holiday displays you can create for your home and yard, because there’s no need to run electric cords anywhere! Remember to position your P-Bulbs as far from your family as possible, as the plutonium is radioactive and has a half-life of 10,000 years. If for any reason you want to get rid of your P-Bulbs, simply apply to the Atomic Energy Commission for a special disposal permit and concrete container. P-Bulbs will change the way you live your life forever!
New light bulb uses no electricity!


LOL Awesome! I'm going to pick up a few of these for my in-laws...
User avatar
furrybill
Peat
Peat
 
Posts: 101
Joined: Thu 28 Feb 2008, 04:00:00

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby dinopello » Tue 15 Mar 2016, 09:38:09

I just replaced bulbs in 2 rooms with the Phillips Hue LED bulbs. They are 60 Watt equivalent and can be any color of rainbow. They can be controlled via smartphone/tablet or special switches with presets and dimmers. They have presets to mix colors for vaious cognitive responses (alert, relax, romanc, etc) The apps can make them respond to music or do a lava lamp mode where they slowly change colors.

Pretty extravagant price-wise but very cool and low energy.
User avatar
dinopello
Light Sweet Crude
Light Sweet Crude
 
Posts: 6088
Joined: Fri 13 May 2005, 03:00:00
Location: The Urban Village

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby dolanbaker » Tue 15 Mar 2016, 14:37:09

So far, I've replaced about 3/4 of all my lamps with LED and so far so good. Many of them are brighter than the CFLs they replace. I expect that CFLs will go the way of incandescent bulbs in the next decade or so as people abandon them.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.:Anonymous
Our whole economy is based on planned obsolescence.
Hungrymoggy "I am now predicting that Europe will NUKE ITSELF sometime in the first week of January"
User avatar
dolanbaker
Intermediate Crude
Intermediate Crude
 
Posts: 3855
Joined: Wed 14 Apr 2010, 10:38:47
Location: Éire

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby Shaved Monkey » Wed 28 Sep 2016, 03:30:34

I just bought a few more LEDs out of China free postage from Ebay
Ive got 3 or 4 regular globes to go but rarely use those lights much.
I will replace my downlights in the kitchen too.
I dont have the lights on much at night I like to watch TV in the dark with the doors open to get a breeze so dont want to attract bugs.
I got a few emergency globes with batteries in them that turn on for 4 hours if we have a power failure.
I put them in lamps so I can move them around as needed in a power outage
Ready to turn Zombies into WWOOFers
User avatar
Shaved Monkey
Intermediate Crude
Intermediate Crude
 
Posts: 2486
Joined: Wed 30 Mar 2011, 01:43:28

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby vox_mundi » Wed 28 Sep 2016, 12:52:14

LED Streetlights Are Giving Neighborhoods the Blues

Early adopters of LED street lighting are struggling with glare and light pollution

If the switch to LEDs had needed any more support, it came from growing evidence about climate change. In the United States, street lighting accounts for a whopping 30 percent [PDF] of all the energy used to generate electricity for outdoor lighting. Another 60 percent goes toward lighting parking lots and garages, and much of that energy is still produced by fossil-fired power plants. Consultants at the firm Navigant, in Chicago, have estimated [PDF] that the United States could save 662 trillion British thermal units—the energy needed to power 5.8 million typical U.S. homes for one year—by converting all remaining non-LED outdoor lighting to LEDs.

Armed with statistics like these, and a mandate to cut energy use wherever they can, municipalities across the United States have installed more than 5.7 million outdoor LED street and area lights. Other towns and cities in Canada, Europe, and Asia have added millions more over the past decade. Amid this rush to adopt outdoor LEDs, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) stressed energy efficiency as the biggest advantage of the new technology while cautioning cities to also consider light output and color quality. But now that ordinary folks have got an eyeful of those new lights, some municipalities are coming down with a case of the early-adopter blues.

For some, those first LED lights have been a fiasco. The harsh glare of certain blue-rich designs is now thought to disrupt people’s sleep patterns and harm nocturnal animals. And these concerns have been heaped on the complaints of astronomers, who as far back as 2009 have criticized the new lights. That’s the year the International Dark-Sky Association, a coalition that opposes light pollution, started worrying that blue-rich LEDs could be “a disaster for dark skies and the environment,” says Chris Monrad, a director of IDA and a lighting consultant in Tucson.

Lately, lighting companies have introduced LED streetlights with a warmer-hued output, and municipalities have begun to adopt them. Some communities, too, are using smart lighting controls to minimize light pollution. They are welcome changes, but they’re happening none too soon: An estimated 10 percent of all outdoor lighting [PDF] in the United States was switched over to an earlier generation of LEDs, which included those problematic blue-rich varieties, at a potential cost of billions of dollars. ...

Research over the past 15 years has shown that humans and other animals have nonvisual receptors in their eyes containing a pigment called melanopsin that senses blue light. Our bodies use that response to control our diurnal cycles, waking in the morning as light increases, peaking in activity at midday when it is most intense, and winding down for sleep at dusk. Though the overall amount of light in a person’s environment has the greatest impact on circadian rhythms, this blue light response is an important factor.

Blue light at the wrong time can disrupt sleep by suppressing production of the sleep-inducing hormone melatonin. You might have noticed, a couple of years ago, the news that looking at your smartphone or other LED-lit screen before bedtime was a bad idea. Much the same is true of blue-rich outdoor LEDs: Their impact on the circadian rhythms associated with sleep is estimated to be five times greater than that from conventional streetlamps.

Ecologists have also long known that the color and intensity of nighttime illumination can affect such wildly diverse creatures as bugs, bats, and birds. Robin Somers-Yeates at the University of Exeter, in England, found in 2013 that blue lighting attracts nocturnal moths, which creates a fluttering buffet for bats. And an important group of slow-flying bats, named Myotis and known as mouse-eared bats, instinctively avoids the light because other, faster-moving bats prey on them, says Gareth Jones of the University of Bristol, in England.

One of the best-understood, and most serious, impacts of bluish lighting is on endangered sea turtles. They evolved to scurry toward the moonlit sea when they hatch, but bluish lights at coastal resorts draw them inland, to be stranded or caught by waiting predators. Electric lights can even lure them back to land once they reach the water.
“There are three classes of people: those who see. Those who see when they are shown. Those who do not see.” ― Leonardo da Vinci

Insensible before the wave so soon released by callous fate. Affected most, they understand the least, and understanding, when it comes, invariably arrives too late.
User avatar
vox_mundi
Intermediate Crude
Intermediate Crude
 
Posts: 3939
Joined: Wed 27 Sep 2006, 03:00:00

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby dolanbaker » Wed 28 Sep 2016, 13:47:15

LED Lights & light pollution, I'm surprised by that report as I've noticed a much reduced "sky glow" effect in places that have LED street lighting. A lot of the issues with street lighting was really caused by poorly designed housings where as most modern designs don't scatter the light.

I'm sure that this really just a transient issue as all infrastructure gets periodically replaced and those older blue LED fittings will be no different.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.:Anonymous
Our whole economy is based on planned obsolescence.
Hungrymoggy "I am now predicting that Europe will NUKE ITSELF sometime in the first week of January"
User avatar
dolanbaker
Intermediate Crude
Intermediate Crude
 
Posts: 3855
Joined: Wed 14 Apr 2010, 10:38:47
Location: Éire

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby Tanada » Wed 28 Sep 2016, 14:11:00

dolanbaker wrote:LED Lights & light pollution, I'm surprised by that report as I've noticed a much reduced "sky glow" effect in places that have LED street lighting. A lot of the issues with street lighting was really caused by poorly designed housings where as most modern designs don't scatter the light.

I'm sure that this really just a transient issue as all infrastructure gets periodically replaced and those older blue LED fittings will be no different.


I think there is a certain psychological factor as well, people have grown used to the sodium vapor lamps with their bright orange color spectrum. Anything new takes a while to get conditioned to the point of seeming normal.
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
User avatar
Tanada
Site Admin
Site Admin
 
Posts: 17050
Joined: Thu 28 Apr 2005, 03:00:00
Location: South West shore Lake Erie, OH, USA

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby jedrider » Wed 28 Sep 2016, 22:27:36

Our Community College has mostly new infrastructure and their street/parking lot lamps appears to be LED arrays. Their light is very nice; none of the bluest tint of early LEDs, just white. Certainly, an improvement in absolute terms.
User avatar
jedrider
Intermediate Crude
Intermediate Crude
 
Posts: 3106
Joined: Thu 28 May 2009, 10:10:44

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby litesong » Mon 17 Oct 2016, 23:00:35

Here's my 5 year old post from another website:
The LEDs covered by a frosted glass waste energy. If done right, some bare LEDs work without making you squint, which the clear glass incandescents can't accomplish. I love the LEDs that you can rotate to place light where you need it, without pouring light into areas you don't need lots of light, specially into your eyeballs. In some circumstances,rotating LEDs draw only 6 watts but can replace 100watt incandescents. If you get them at the right price & for the right application, they will pay for themselves in 2000 hours! Every 2000 hours after that, they keep ~$15 in your pocket.Three such LEDs have saved us $60 so far...... each!
/////

Yes, you read right! The 6 watt draw 100 LED light(one LED burned out) replaced a 100 watt incandescent bulb, saving 94 Watts & rotates to provide light exactly where you need it..... WITHOUT being a spotlight, providing even light over nearly 180 arc-degrees.
After four years we replaced two of the rotating LED 6 watt LEDs & now all the lights have provided at least 4 years use. The latest have provided 5 years use & are still in use. The workhorse light is used at least 4000 hours per year, been going for 5 years & 20,000 hours. That $15, 6 watt LED light has saved.....now get this..... 1880 kilowatt-hrs of electricity & almost $170! If it lasts another year, it will have saved almost $200 in electricity cost!
One of the newer(still 5 years old) rotating LED lights is brighter(7 watt draw), has an even more pleasant yellow cast, & uses a metal housing, replacing a plastic housing LED light, which was yellowing over the years. The metal probably was needed vs. the plastic. Altho in use for 4 or 5 years, think this light will be available to replace the workhorse light once it expires, since it has thousands of hours less use.
litesong
Permanently Banned
 
Posts: 270
Joined: Fri 31 Jul 2009, 11:15:52

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby litesong » Fri 21 Oct 2016, 08:49:54

litesong wrote: One of the newer(still 5 years old) rotating LED lights is brighter(7 watt draw), has an even more pleasant yellow cast, & uses a metal housing, replacing a plastic housing LED light, which was yellowing over the years. The metal probably was needed vs. the plastic. Altho in use for 4 or 5 years, think this light will be available to replace the workhorse light once it expires, since it has thousands of hours less use.


LED light durability lets you forget LED lights. I hadn't been thinking of the LEDs for years. After writing the recent above post, I did start using the 7 watt draw LED light as the workhorse light. Yeah, the room is a bit brighter & more pleasant now. The less bright past workhorse LED light is now burning with other lights & its dimmer cast isn't noticed among the other lights.
litesong
Permanently Banned
 
Posts: 270
Joined: Fri 31 Jul 2009, 11:15:52

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby jedrider » Fri 21 Oct 2016, 10:38:42

Our technology is pretty amazing. Too bad that all it's done is separate us further from nature. Now, nature is pulling away from us.
User avatar
jedrider
Intermediate Crude
Intermediate Crude
 
Posts: 3106
Joined: Thu 28 May 2009, 10:10:44

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby litesong » Fri 21 Oct 2016, 18:14:41

jedrider wrote:Our technology is pretty amazing. Too bad that all it's done is separate us further from nature.


Technology gives us the ability to move closer to or further away from nature. Before the industrial revolution, lots of people had removed themselves from nature, whether in big cities or small towns, where you had to work so long & hard that nature became a distant or non-existent memory. Of course, the rich can divorce themselves from nature, even if they're in nature. Saying this tho, nature itself can be a tough taskmaster.
litesong
Permanently Banned
 
Posts: 270
Joined: Fri 31 Jul 2009, 11:15:52

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby KaiserJeep » Wed 02 Nov 2016, 23:42:36

I just thought to update this thread, since LASER headlights are now appearing on the horizon, replacing LED headlights on high-end European cars:

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/laser-powered-headlight.htm/printable

The LASERs merely excite the phosphorus on a target (not a lens) in front of the LASER diode aperture/emitter. The white light produced by the glowing phosphorus is then focused by the reflector onto the road. The LASER headlights are not brighter or longer range than modern LED headlights, the advantage is that they achieve the same brightness as LED headlights while consuming half the electrical energy.

Both LASERs and LEDs are mono-chromatic light sources, ill-suited to headlight usage. (LEDs are incoherent sources, LASERs are coherent light, this difference accounts for the efficiency boost.) The broad spectrum white light is produced when the mono-chromatic light is absorbed by a careful mix of rare-earth phosphors and the combination of frequencies in the glow is perceived as a white light in your eye. In the prior generation of "white" LEDs, the same phosphors are incorporated into the plastic encapsulating the LED chip.

The problem with "white light" LEDs and LASERs is those same phosphors. The oldest mass-produced white LEDs are now getting to be a decade or so old and the phosphors are aging. As they age, the phosphorescence fades - emits less light. The life of such devices is measured in "half-lifes", and at the end of one half-life, the glow is half as bright as on a new device. A likely half-life selected for a headlight device would be on the order of 10 years. At the end of 10 years of operation, the LED headlight or LASER headlight is half as bright. This point might be at 25 years of vehicle life, since you do not use the headlights in daylight.

In addition to phosphorus aging, one can expect color shifts in the nominally "white" light, since the different color phosphors are different chemical compounds, and age at different rates. Phosphorus aging in LEDs and LASER diodes is similar to the aging of phosphors formerly used to coat the screens of old CRT televisions and color monitors - some of the same chemicals are used.

Within a decade, LASER diode sourced white bulbs should be in residences and other general lighting applications. However since LASER devices require very expensive precision 'lapping" of the silicon or gallium arsenide or other semiconductor chip, LED devices/bulbs are likely to remain in production, even though only half as bright as the LASER bulb of the same wattage.

https://youtu.be/SolKqp8h6kc
KaiserJeep 2.0, Neural Subnode 0010 0000 0001 0110 - 1001 0011 0011, Tertiary Adjunct to Unimatrix 0000 0000 0001

Resistance is Futile, YOU will be Assimilated.

Warning: Messages timestamped before April 1, 2016, 06:00 PST were posted by the unmodified human KaiserJeep 1.0
KaiserJeep
Light Sweet Crude
Light Sweet Crude
 
Posts: 6094
Joined: Tue 06 Aug 2013, 17:16:32
Location: Wisconsin's Dreamland

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby dolanbaker » Thu 03 Nov 2016, 00:38:42

A likely half-life selected for a headlight device would be on the order of 10 years. At the end of 10 years of operation, the LED headlight or LASER headlight is half as bright. This point might be at 25 years of vehicle life, since you do not use the headlights in daylight.

I don't know of anyone who drives a car for 24 hours a day 365 days a year!
The nearest you'll ever get the that type of usage is a shared taxi, and even that would not be continually on the road.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.:Anonymous
Our whole economy is based on planned obsolescence.
Hungrymoggy "I am now predicting that Europe will NUKE ITSELF sometime in the first week of January"
User avatar
dolanbaker
Intermediate Crude
Intermediate Crude
 
Posts: 3855
Joined: Wed 14 Apr 2010, 10:38:47
Location: Éire

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby Tanada » Thu 03 Nov 2016, 03:58:13

KaiserJeep wrote:The problem with "white light" LEDs and LASERs is those same phosphors. The oldest mass-produced white LEDs are now getting to be a decade or so old and the phosphors are aging. As they age, the phosphorescence fades - emits less light. The life of such devices is measured in "half-lifes", and at the end of one half-life, the glow is half as bright as on a new device. A likely half-life selected for a headlight device would be on the order of 10 years. At the end of 10 years of operation, the LED headlight or LASER headlight is half as bright. This point might be at 25 years of vehicle life, since you do not use the headlights in daylight.


On the contrary, I am many other people routinely turn headlights on after starting the car and before leaving our parking spaces to provide the slight but real safety increase by making our vehicles more noticeable. Driving a compact car makes it useful to increase your visibility so the ID-10-T pilots of those SUV's don't run you down for the minor expense of replacing your headlight bulbs more often is well worth the cost.

Thanks for the interesting article, but given the already very low power usage by the current generation of LED house lighting even cutting the power usage in half is a very small change to the household expenses. The LASER and LED version would have to be essentially the same price before the power usage difference would make switching worthwhile.
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
User avatar
Tanada
Site Admin
Site Admin
 
Posts: 17050
Joined: Thu 28 Apr 2005, 03:00:00
Location: South West shore Lake Erie, OH, USA

Re: LED Light Bulbs (Merged)

Unread postby GHung » Thu 03 Nov 2016, 09:56:30

I bought four of the latest generation Phillips LED household bulbs the other day at the HD for about $7. They've come way down in price, and the 60 watters, shown as using 8.5 watts, are showing 7.9 watts on the Kill-O-Watt meter. No point in changing those out since all of our lighting at home is now LED and performing nicely.

As for running car headlights during the day, I added a set of daytime running lights (LED) to my truck for the same reasons Tanada turns on headlights. The cheap set from Ebay didn't last but a few months, but I found a nice set of flexible strip LEDs at Walmart for about $25. I used duelling relays so they turn on when the truck is started and turn off when the headlights are on. Not too hard to do. The strips are peel-and-stick and slid into the narrow space just below the headlamps; look factory. Nice and bright, hopefully they'll discourage our elderly drivers from Florida from just PULLING OUT INTO TRAFFIC WHENEVER THEY FEEL LIKE IT CAUSING ME TO SLAM ON THE BREAKS. I've also beefed up my brake lights with LEDs.
Blessed are the Meek, for they shall inherit nothing but their Souls. - Anonymous Ghung Person
User avatar
GHung
Intermediate Crude
Intermediate Crude
 
Posts: 3093
Joined: Tue 08 Sep 2009, 16:06:11
Location: Moksha, Nearvana

Previous

Return to Conservation & Efficiency

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 20 guests