Market dynamics may change over the next five years due to slowing LCD demand.
As president of LED Lighting Technologies, Dr. M. Nisa Khan consults in the solid-state lighting industry and educates consumers about LED lighting. She has a bachelor’s degree in physics and mathematics, and master’s and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering. Email her at nisa.khan@iem-asset.com
Over the last four years, I’ve written ST columns on LED lamps’ technologies, challenges, safety, trends and markets. In addition to investigations and analysis, I’ve also compared LEDs to other, existing lighting systems, and discussed sign-industry applications. Interestingly, some my analytics may have been ahead of their time and, consequently, perceived as pessimistic by some readers.
However, because the science of light has been my interest and a branch of my profession for more than 25 years, I’ve periodically presented my scientific findings -- some of which are still ongoing -- to the various, related industries and, also, emphasized better ways to bring LED lighting in our lives.
Particularly, I’ve discussed and analyzed such LED-technology challenges as electrical requirements, omni-directionality, yield and thermal or lifespan complexities. These issues, today, more ubiquitously discussed, are familiar topics – or, in some instances, applied to real and pertinent applications.
-->Because of the industry’s current acknowledgment of existing (and past) complexities, I envision the solid-state-lighting (SSL) manufacturing field will move faster to resolve its challenges. The resulting advancements will cause LED lighting markets to substantially escalate over the next several years.
But what can we expect, say, beyond 2014? What does LED lighting’s long-term future look like?
As recently as the 2007 Lightfair tradeshow, many lighting companies, especially those lacking LED technology R&D programs, didn’t foresee LEDs as solutions for next-generation lighting.
At this year’s show, the same lighting companies proudly displayed LED-lamp prototypes -- linear, tubular and compact – designed for various commercial and residential applications. Further, and accompanied by positive proclamations of LEDs’ future, these companies now tout new lamp configurations that, they say, illuminate living spaces in novel ways. Predictably, their marketing text claims LED technology offers greater advantages over incandescent and fluorescent lights.
Interestingly, such companies as Osram Sylvania, Philips and GE Lighting Solutions have, for some time, confidently developed LED technologies.
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This announcement comes on the cusp of Toronto’s conversion of the CN Tower lighting to more energy-efficient LED lighting, which is designed to use 60-percent less energy than the Tower’s lighting did in the 1990s. Other current and planned LED projects include solar-powered LED lights in a park and LED lighting in a plaza parking garage.
"Combating climate change is the issue of our time, possibly of all time and Torontonians are demanding that this city lead by example," said Toronto Mayor David Miller. "Through the use of cutting-edge, energy-efficient technologies, we can and will be a leader. We expect that by deploying LEDs throughout Toronto, including on our most famous landmark, the CN Tower, we will be accomplishing the goal of reducing energy use and costs and greenhouse-gas emission."
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