Member Article

All LEDs Are Not Created Equal

At euroLED this year the most interesting speaker by far was a manager from Philips. His presentation was given with passion borne out of frustration and it certainly resonated with those of us who are trying to provide clients with better quality LED lighting products. To paraphrase “anyone attempting to sell premium LED products are in for a bloody tough 18 months to 2yrs, because there is no standardised way for buyers to assess the LEDs put before them and it takes around 18months for the “crap” to show its true colours.

The majority of purchasing decisions are based on cost despite the accepted caveat “you pay peanuts…” The inevitable problems that follow from colour shifting to complete failure, the causes can be poorly binned LEDs, ineffective thermal management, driver design, cheap component selection, quality control in assembly or any combination of the above.” For those of us who meet prospective buyers face to face, we hear these horror stories every week so we know how seriously this warning should be taken.

In an attempt to bring some transparency to the market The Lighting Industry Association are initiating a market surveillance programme with the goal of naming and shaming those products that simply do not meet their brochures performance claims. This is good news and definitely a step in the right direction but given the rapid growth in the number of companies now selling LEDs in the UK, its impact, at least initially, could be marginal. For a more wide reaching strategy we have to move to minimum benchmarks such as UKAS accredited independent test data.

Without universally accepted standards how can the buyer justify to their superiors paying the premium for the better quality LED, especially at a time when budgets are under more pressure than ever before? And yet this is exactly why it is so crucial that investment in LED is an informed decision and not one based on marketing collateral and heavy discounting. Good LED is not a commodity product, its a design led highly engineered solution that, in the right applications will repay its initial cost many times over. In many ways it is the most important tool we have for tackling energy efficiency in buildings. As a retrofit it is the most visible, least disruptive solution to install while providing the biggest ?bang for your buck? in terms of energy and carbon abatement, and thats before you factor in the maintenance and relamping savings.

In addition sustainability and environmental responsibility have risen up the boardroom agenda in recent years and here again good LED provides an answer. And yet there are still estimated to be as much as 100m linear fluorescent tubes sold in the UK every year. A technology thats more than 80yrs old and still dominates commercial buildings, fluorescents are fragile glass tubes filled with hazardous waste and despite 5yrs of WEEE many still end up in landfill. The justification for this is based on a common misconception that fluorescents are ?cheap? which of course they are if you don?t factor cost of ownership. If you ignore the electricity usage, forget the carbon, accept the maintenance & relamping costs and have no interest in sustainability and environmental responsibility, then yes, compared to LED, fluorescents are cheap.

None of this is news, so why does the status quo persist? Conversations with buyers would suggest that as an industry we only have ourselves to blame. Many have tried LED, typically on a small project, and been badly let down by inferior products and abysmal service. Networking, forums and social media allows for near instantaneous sharing of these painful experiences. The result is a skeptical audience that consider LED as a standardised technology in the same way that fluorescents have now become. Nobody cares that your T8?s are Osram, Philips or GE other than Osram, Philips or GE.

Fluorescents have reached their zenith and differences in performance are indiscernible. If the same were true for LED then price is indeed the appropriate measure. However, LED is only really getting started and the development potential is truly staggering but you dont need to wait to take advantage. The opportunity to eliminate fluorescents exists today but only if you can sort the ?wheat from the chaff?. When a sales person proclaims 100,000 hour lamp life but only a 2yr warranty, the alarm bells should be ringing. The best LEDs come with a warranty that covers the entire expected lamp life regardless of burning hours, so 24/7/365 if thats what the site demands are. This means you have effectively guaranteed the return on investment which you simply cannot do with poorly made LEDs.

We are facing a ?perfect storm? of rising energy costs, mandatory carbon reporting,growing energy demands, reduced generating capacity and new european directives all at a time when we are attempting to migrate to renewables on a creaking, outdated network infrastructure. Since Nichia developed the white LED in 1996 the potential for halving the electricity drawn by commercial lighting was born, surely, now is the time for UK organisations to future-proof their building assets and invest in high quality LED.

Paul Reid, Director XLED Lighting Company Ltd

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Sophie Drake .