President Joanne Cole points us to this article that was written for the Charlotte chapter by Rick Regan. She shares it here with their permission.

LED’s – Why Is Everybody So Excited?

A recent International Trade Show and Conference devoted to Architectural and Commercial Lighting held this year in Las Vegas, raised the question: Why is everybody getting so excited about LEDs? The LED products that most of us have seen have been too dim for serious commercial use, and kind of a blue-ish light to boot. Not ready for Prime Time!

Here’s the thing, LEDs have been steadily getting brighter and more powerful, year after year. And this year marks the first time that LED products will be able to challenge the performance of every kind of light: Incandescent, High Pressure Sodium, Metal-Halide and Fluorescent, to name a few.

The magic number is 100. That is: 100 lumens-per-Watt of electricity. The very latest T8 & T5 products hover around this 100 lu/W level, and HPS and M-H are in the 100 lu/W range too. After 40 years of development and improvements, 100 lu/W is about the best you can get out of conventional lighting. (source: IESNA Lighting Handbook)
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