How LED lighting can save on costs and help the environment

Harking back to a topic I posted earlier on this blog about LED replacement lamps for amusement park rides or lack thereof I thought you might find a recently published article from Funworld Magazine in which I was quoted interesting. Hopefully you find it interesting, I enjoyed being interviewed by Ms. Gable and I think the article illustrates some of the pros and cons of adopting LEDs within the amusement ride industry. Give it a read.

As usual, your comments are appreciated!

Click here to read the article on the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions website

Technorati Tags: leds, solid-state lighting, lighting industry news, lighting industry market, lighting market, solid-state lighting, led news, led technology, leds in the news, global industry analysts report, energy star, energy-star, energy savings, saving energy, energystar, energy efficient, municipal lighting, municipal lighting projects, led city, led cities, led-based municipal lighting, led municipal light, municipal leds, municipal light design, municipal street light, street lights, led street lights, led streetlight, led streetlights, municipal streetlight, municipal streetlights, architectural lighting, architectural lighting design, solid-state architectural lighting, led architectural lighting, architectural led lighting, lighting design, solid-state lighting, amusement park, amusement lighting, leds in amusement parks, ride engineering, ride lighting, ride design, amusement design, amusement ride design, amusement ride lighting, amusement ride leds, leds in amusement rides

Even More Free Architectural Lighting Design Tools!

I just discovered a terrific resource for architectural lighting designers called the New Buildings Institute! I’ll let the NBI explain who the NBI is here: “The NBI works with national, regional, state and utility groups to promote improved energy performance in commercial new construction. NBI manages projects involving building research, design guidelines and code activities to ensure all elements of this chain are available for use by energy efficiency programs throughout the United States.” While the NBI is concerned with the energy efficiency of entire buildings, their expertise and the resources they make available for free are truly amazing.

First and foremost on the list is the absolutely gigantic Advanced Lighting Guidelines: 2003 Edition. This 445 page book is the absolute industry standard on achieving good lighting design and is an absolute must have. The really cool thing about it is that the NBI makes the PDF available for free! It is a “view-only” PDF but so what! The PDF is a terrific resource to have and if your looking to get NCQLP Lighting Certified, you’re going to need this book. If you absolutely have to have a printed copy, the book is available for a measly $70, not bad considering what typical industry-specific reference books cost.

Next the NBI has made available a bunch of photometric files (IES files you can import into programs like DIALux) specifically on skylights and light wells. While we’re on the subject, they also have SkyCalc which is an Excel spreadsheet that is designed to identify the optimum skylighting design for a building and compare the net energy cost savings using various control schemes.

Next they have made available several research reports on daylighting, views, and various other building factors on productivity in schools, retail establishments, and commercial offices conducted for the California Energy Commission. Other reports include skylighting and a baseline report of California Outdoor Lighting practices and energy use. These are excellent references for any architectural lighting designer but of particular interest to anyone working with light in schools, retail, or commercial office buildings.

Lastly there are some other resources that are available free that I will let you find. So head on over to their lighting page and take a look.

Technorati Tags: architectural lighting, architectural lighting design, solid-state architectural lighting, led architectural lighting, architectural led lighting, lighting design, solid-state lighting design, lighting designers, lighting artist, artistic lighting, lighting engineering, architectural lighting industry, designing with light, architectural design, office lighting, solid-state office lighting, office lighting design, 3d software, 3d rendering, architectural visualization, visualization software, 3d rendering software, lighting design software, lighting visualization software, 3d architectural rendering, interior lighting, light modeling, 3d modeling, lighting design tools, architectural lighting design tools, free lighting design tools, free lighting analysis software, lighting analysis, lighting analysis software, road lighting analysis, free lighting analysis tools, lighting analysis tools, free software, cool software, cool free software, lighting cad, light cad, light engineering, free research, research reports, lighting research, building lighting

Powered by ScribeFire.

Architectural Lighting Asks, “What will be the fate of the incandescent lamp?”

Architectural Lighting called for submissions to answer the question, “What will be the fate of the incandescent lamp?”. In Jeff Miller’s (President-elect IALD, Director Pivotal Lighting) submission he makes an interesting, if nostalgic and sentimental argument in favor of the incandescent bulb. Click here to read Jeff’s Submission

My feeling is that the light bulb and it’s warm, familiar, welcoming glow is far from dead although, with recent advances from Cree, it’s only a matter of time but here’s my take on why it’s not over yet:

Yes, it’s true that the light bulb has greater power consumption then the LED but know that while LEDs have surpassed light bulbs in terms of efficacy, they are only now experiencing the same efficacy as fluorescent lamps (click to read about Cree Inc’s new XLamp LED) but simply replacing incandescent lamps with LEDs just wont work in every application. Certain LED luminaire manufacturers are currently grappling with the technical problems of replacing lamps with LEDs where the lamps are used outdoors in cold environments where the heat in their light output served the practical purpose of keeping the luminaires lens from icing over. This wasn’t discovered until all the lamps (in this case runway beacons at an airport) had been replaced with LEDs and the manufacturer has to now scramble to come up with a solution. Hah! Score one for lamps!

Headlights on your car is another one. Audi recently announced they have developed total LED based headlamps for their top-end automobiles, one can ask why and at what price? These LED headlamps require active cooling from fans in one of the dirtiest, vibration-prone environments know to man where small ball-bearing, brushless fans just won’t last that long. Even if the high-power LED modules used for the headlamps will last 20,000 hours, the fans will fail long before that (click here to read full article). It’s $50 – $100 bucks for a set of two high-end Xenon or Halogen headlamps that go right in (you could replace them yourself) but the LED headlamp assemblies likely require a degree in electrical engineering and a 400 page printed service manual (save the trees!). These LED headlamps with their integrated fans (and controllers), are they really saving anything in
terms of energy? No, cars generate their own electricity and the LEDS certainly are not helping with exhaust emissions. Maybe the auto manufacturers could really concentrate on putting out less pollutants then grabbing some headlines with LED technology. Score two for the lamps!

Finally, the BIG reason light bulbs will be with us for awhile is it will take a really, really, REALLY long time to bake a 4-inch cake in an LED powered Easy Bake Oven!

What does all this mean? Nothing, its a fact of life that the incandescent and eventually even the fluorescent lamp will eventually be replaced but they’re not going out without a fight.

Thanks to Jim Allen for setting the record straight. I have a tendency to ramble on thinking one thing but writing another.

Technorati Tags: architectural lighting, architectural lighting design, solid-state architectural lighting, led architectural lighting, architectural led lighting, lighting design, solid-state lighting design, lighting designers, lighting artist, artistic lighting, lighting engineering, architectural lighting industry, designing with light, architectural design, office lighting, solid-state office lighting, office lighting design, leds , solid-state lighting , lighting industry news , lighting industry market , lighting market , solid-state lighting market , lighting market analysis , global led market , global led news, global lighting industry , global lighting fixtures , global lighting , led technology , leds in the news , Cree, Cree XLamps, XLamp LEDs, XLamp, brightest white led, record breaking leds, 1000 lumens, leds replace light bulbs, light bulbs, lamp replacements, led breakthroughs, car headlamps, car headlights, auto headlights, auto headlamps, audi r8, audi news, audi led headlamps, audi led headlights, audi head lights, audi head lamps, leds in audi r8

Powered by ScribeFire.

Osram supplies LEDs for street lights, unveils new Dragon

…green clovers, blue stars, and now with NEW Golden Dragons….

For all you architectural lighting designers and engineers out there: Osram has released a new Golden Dragon LED which incorporates new oval shaped lenses (20 and 40 degree viewing angles) specifically for road and footpath lighting. Fitted into luminaires from Soltec, these solar-powered fixtures produce 60 lumens at 350 milliamps (typical efficacy of 54 lumens/watt).

Maybe when Osram releases an IES file for these things, I’ll fire’em up in DIALux and setup an example roadway lighting design simulation. We’ll just have to wait…….while your waiting, click here to read the whole story from LEDs Magazine.

Technorati Tags: leds , solid-state lighting , lighting industry news , lighting industry market , lighting market , solid-state lighting market , lighting market analysis , global led market , global led news, global lighting industry , global lighting fixtures , global lighting , led technology , leds in the news , OSRAM inc, OSRAM leds, OSRAM modules, dragon leds, ostar leds, record breaking leds, brightest red led, brightest green led, dragon leds, golden dragon leds, road lights, pathway lighting, footpath lighting, lensed golden dragon leds, osram roadway lighting

Powered by ScribeFire.

Awesome FREE Lighting Analysis Software!

Recently, I stumbled across DIALux which is an advanced, yet easy to use lighting analysis package. I was totally amazed to find that such a well-polished program would be distribued totally free! The program is for anyone who is responsible for lighting design planning and implementation including lighting designers, architects, engineers, electricians, contractors, bloggers, smurfs, whoever! This program is just cool and fun to play with!

Don’t get me wrong, there is wayyyy more under the hood here than I touched on in my tinkering: there’s all sorts of acronym type things that only someone working in the biz would know or would be inclined to find out what they mean such as EN 1838, DIN, UTE, UGR, etc… but almost anyone can produce accurate and understandable lighting analysis reports.

One of the major features is the independence of DIALux from luminaire manufacturers. In fact, DIALux does not come with any installed luminaire fixtures, instead you go online and pick and chose from dozens of major commercial, industrial, and residential lighting manufacturers DIALux plugins that are essentially online catalogs of their luminaires that can be easily clicked on to import them into a lighting design. Many of these plugins can be accessed right in DIALux if you have an active internet connection, and once installed, are ready to go. It’s very easy.This gives you a choice of thousands of luminaires, lamps, leds, power supplies, etc.. to choose from. After about an hour of playing, I had installed plugins from Sylvania, Osram, and more. If a particular manufacturer you like doesn’t have a plugin, see if they have published IES files for their fixtures since DIALux can import these files to create new, accurate luminaires. You can also create your own from scratch if you need to. Powerful stuff!

Almost everything is taken into account in an analysis including the room size, materials on the floors, walls ,ceiling, if there are windows, what type of glass they have, what is the outside light properties, where the luminaires are placed, how many there are, and how often the room is used and cleaned. I’m not kidding on that last one, it gets that deep but it never seems overly complicated or hard to use.

You can pick your luminaires that you want to use and in some cases, even the lamps inside the luminaires and then tell DIALux how much light you want total and it can plugin the correct number of luminaires at the right spacing for the shape and size of the room. Everything is done through a cool 3D CAD window which shows the scene your working on in solid-modeled 3D goodness. You can add windows, doors, columns, sky lights, luminaires, furniture, etc.. here (this is major fun here!) and then calculate the lighting distribution and see in textured, smoothed 3D exactly how the light is distributed throughout the room. The reports break all of this down to exactly how much light is hitting areas on the floor, the walls, the work surfaces, etc.. and shows all of this in cool line drawing charts and graphs.

DIALux is not limited to indoor scenes, you can work with your buildings facade, render general outdoor scenes, plan out road lighting schemes, setup road lamp maintenance plans, and more. This program even integrates POV-Ray high quality, radiosity rendering. This is just too cool!

If your at all involved in architectural lighting or any kind of lighting design application, then you need to have this program in your arsenal. A program of this caliber, for an industry this niche, could easily cost $1000’s but again I say, it’s FREE and so are all of the luminaire plugins!

Heres a cut & paste from their features page:

What is special about DIALux?

• Daylight: Perfect calculation and visualization.
• Lighting scenes: Realistic planning and documentation.
• Up-to-date: Easy compliance with national and international standards.
• Emergency lighting: in accordance with EN 1838, simple positioning of exactly the right number of luminaires along escape routes and in anti-panic zones.
• Calculation: latest radiosity procedures, fast and always correct.
• Colour: Lighting design with colour filter coloures lightsources and materials.
• Interactive 3-D visualization: Simply move around the room.
• Movies: Walk through the photo realistic visualization of your light planning and send the film to your customer via email.
• Visualization: Use of textures and furniture for realistic rendering.
• Photo realism: with integrated raytracing module.
• False colours: False colours provide quantitative analysis of complex geometries at a glance.
• Results: Results can be printed out or transmitted as a pdf file. Each view and each rendering can be saved as a .jpg file.
• Interaction: Import and export: .dwg and .dxf files can be imported and exported with results after completion of the planning process.
• 3-D Import: Integration of complete buildings as 3-D objects.
• DIALux Light: Easy to use, step-by-step lighting design.
• Assistants: On request they help in the planning of indoor and street lighting.
• Drag and drop: It is so simple to place furniture, surfaces (textures) and luminaires in the room.
• Intelligent elements: Wall lights are always positioned correctly on the wall and the computer is always on the table.
• Alignment of luminaires: One click on the light aiming point is enough.
• Guides: These lead you step by step through special questions related to lighting design.

What light fixture data does DIALux use?
DIALux works with the international data formats of all manufacturers. The DIALux partners offer an electronic catalogue (DIALux PlugIn). Here you will find all the product information needed to select the optimal light fixtures for your project.

How do I obtain light fixture data?
On CD directly from the manufacturers, via download from the manufacturers’ websites or as an online plug-in directly from within DIALux.

Does DIALux also speak my language?
DIALux is active globally and currently speaks 26 languages.

Do I need long to become acquainted with DIALux?
DIALux is modelled on common standard programs (Windows XP) and is thus simple and intuitive to use.

What features will DIALux have in the future?
The market will determine that! DIALux is undergoing continuous refinement. Information on current versions and patches is available

Internationally known lighting fixture manufacturers are partners of DIALux and this group is growing continually.
Current data from our partners can be obtained via the individual online plug-Ins (directly from within DIALux) or at www.dialux.com.

You can download DIALux here

Click here for a partial list of luminaire/lamp manufacturers with plugins (you can also download plugins here)

Click here to checkout a sample report I created in the short time I’ve been playing around along with a screenshot (PDF). Here’s a POV_Ray rendering I did of the room in the report (DIALux can render quite nicely itself but can also automatically send out the 3D scene to POV-ray for better rendering including radiosity lighting calculations:

Click thumbnail for full size image
Go get this program now! It’s cool

Technorati Tags: architectural lighting, architectural lighting design, solid-state architectural lighting, led architectural lighting, architectural led lighting, lighting design, solid-state lighting design, lighting designers, lighting artist, artistic lighting, lighting engineering, architectural lighting industry, designing with light, architectural design, office lighting, solid-state office lighting, office lighting design, 3d software, 3d rendering, architectural visualization, visualization software, 3d rendering software, lighting design software, lighting visualization software, 3d architectural rendering, interior lighting, light modeling, 3d modeling, lighting design tools, architectural lighting design tools, free lighting design tools, free lighting analysis software, lighting analysis, lighting analysis software, road lighting analysis, free lighting analysis tools, lighting analysis tools, free software, cool software, cool free software, lighting cad, light cad, light engineering, luminaries, plugins

Powered by ScribeFire.

Inexpensive Tools for Architectural Lighting Analysis

For any lighting designers or architects that have to work with lighting design and want to do some visualization for your clients might I suggest the powerful yet low cost combination of Google Sketchup Pro and Kerkythea Rendering System. Google Sketchup is a terrific program (I use it extensively myself both professionally and outside my company and I spec’d it FOR my company) to rapidly and quite intuitively make 3D models of almost anything and is particularly well suited for architecture. It’s own rendering capabilities lean towards the “hand-drawn sketch” look hence the name but when you combine it with Kerkythea which is a fabulous and quite powerful rendering system, the results can be truly amazing. Better yet, to anyone interested, this combination of software is highly functional, easy to use, and quite a bit cheaper than the bigger name packages out there since Sketchup is only $495.00 (single license) and Kerkythea is totally free! There is a free version of Sketchup for those who want to try it out first.

If your interested, check out this thread about using Sketchup and Kerkythea for Architectural Lighting Analysis from the Kerkythea forum.

Here is a sample image from the above mentioned thread that shows what Sketchup and kerkythea can do and quickly too!

Fly over to my LED Development Blog to checkout a couple of non-architectural lighting related Sketchup and Kerkythea renderings I did.

Technorati Tags: architectural lighting, architectural lighting design, solid-state architectural lighting, led architectural lighting, architectural led lighting, lighting design, solid-state lighting design, lighting designers, lighting artist, artistic lighting, lighting engineering, architectural lighting industry, designing with light, architectural design, office lighting, solid-state office lighting, office lighting design, sketchup, google sketchup, 3d software, 3d rendering, architectural visualization, visualization software, 3d rendering software, lighting design software, lighting visualization software, kerkythea, kerkythea rendering system, 3d architectural rendering, interior lighting, light modeling, 3d modeling, lighting design tools, architectural lighting design tools

Powered by ScribeFire.

Solid-State Lighting Trashes Fluorescent Tubes

Well, at least in one way the just dawned on me that may not be evident to everyone and I am sure is overlooked when discussing the cost savings of switching from T-x based fluorescent lighting (you know, the tubes that hang in most offices) to LED based bi-pin fixtures such as those from EVERLED . By now your probably wondering WHAT I am talking about. I’ll get to it in a second. Fluorescent lighting still remains more efficient and cost-effective than LEDs but with technology rapidly catching up (check out my LED Development Blog for the latest news on that front. ) LEDs are proving they can compete, certainly it looks good for LEDs to take a major chunk out of the compact fluorescent market anyway but while efficacy of LEDs remains below that of fluorescents and energy savings a toss-up depending on vampire power consumption of LED controllers and manufacturers that misstate their LED specifications, one thing remains clear to me: you can throw LEDs in the trash. Try that with your fluorescent tubes with their Mercury. Hah! So while things like efficacy and the “real” energy savings are still going around and around, LEDs have two things working in their favor, cost-savings on maintenance due to their generally much longer lifespan and also cost-savings on disposal since you can just toss LED based fixtures into the trash while fluorescent tubes must be handled carefully and are considered toxic waste.

Working in the LED industry as I do, I’m not sure why this never occured to me before or, since I started this blog, why I haven’t run across someone else stating what would appear to be the obvious but I didn’t and so there it is.

Let the comments roll!

Lighting Form, Fit, and Function Combine With Architecture with Stunning Results

Fluid, flowing architecture demands lighting equally flowing and dramatic. Lighting designers are forces to work hand-in-hand with artists and architects to fully realize a clients visions while still remaining fully grounded in practicality. It is often a touch-and-go two-step dance when engineers, artists, and designers are often pulling at opposite ends and have to compromise. These types of lighting projects can become cluttered and needlessly complicated quickly if the designers don’t have a good understanding of the physical and artistic properties of the building itself and how artificial and natural lighting will interact to best fit the design requirements.The Agbar Tower Auditorium, Barcelona (click to read about the project)
project is a good example of a lighting design that has practical roles to fill yet remains faithful to the architecture it is contained in and even enhances it.

Kudos to ECLER!

Technorati Tags: architectural lighting, architectural lighting design, solid-state architectural lighting, led architectural lighting, architectural led lighting, lighting design, solid-state lighting design, lighting designers, lighting artist, artistic lighting, lighting engineering, architectural lighting industry, designing with light, architectural design, office lighting, solid-state office lighting, office lighting design

Powered by ScribeFire.

Architectural Designers Require New Approach From LED Distributors

Distributors see LED lighting opportunity
Sometimes the architectural designers tries to go outside the specs in the pursuit of the aesthetic and the distributor, if properly positioned with knowledgeable applications engineers, has to set them back on the straight and narrow. My company, both as a distributor and a manufacturer of LED-based lighting products that are particularly suited to architectural use, is seeing both sides of coin as explained in the article. There is a lot that the distributor needs to convey to the designer, these are not just simply plug-and-play replacements for traditional light fixtures. The are sophisticated devices capable of so much more than traditional lights can do. Not only do distributors need to make designers aware of the constraints of using solid-state lighting but must also make sure their aware of all the features and benefits too. Anyway, check out the whole article, it’s worth a look.

Powered by ScribeFire.