"THE FUTURE IS (ALMOST) NOW: IS THE LED LIGHT MAINSTREAM?"

I have borrowed some quotes from the above mentioned article that appeared in “enLIGHTenment” magazine’s July, 2013 issue written by Ted Konnerth, CEO of Egret Consulting Group. A lot of this article is technical so I have selected passages that pertain to consumers.

Given the recent attention our industry has paid to solid-state lighting, I am sure it is hard for you to believe that fluorescent, high intensity discharge (HID), and incandescent products still represent 85 percent of all lighting sales. I’ve attended and led innumerable discussions at industry gatherings on the emergence of LED. And from what we’ve heard, the future is now. However, new technologies always take time to gain full acceptance. The legacy lighting manufacturers have millions of capital dollars invested in tooling, machinery, and processes that limit their ability to make wholesale changes to their companies. The new entrants have no embedded capital limitations, but they don’t have the channel relationships to push LED adoption at a greater pace. And, their limitation of lighting expertise limits the ability to match LED’s benefits with lighting application expertise.

According to a Department of Energy Report from last year, LED lighting will reach a predicted market share of 74 percent by 2030. I believe the rate of adoption will be far faster than that; but the limiting factor will be centered on design.” (My emphasis).
“Lighting Will Look & Feel Different
To move the industry forward, it’s imperative to have a robust exchange of ideas between fixture designers and lighting designers. Given that lighting will interface within the overall electronic control systems of buildings, the migration of lighting and all things information-based will be crucial. The benefits of LED are proven, so now the discussion has to move to the proper application of LED as a light source and designing lighting systems that incorporate proper lighting into an overall efficient design. LED has created so much discussion that we have largely lost the emphasis on “lighting.”
“Proper lighting involves so much more than brightness. Glare, comfort, uniformity, color rendering, accent, layering, and “feel” are the fundamentals of quality lighting.” (My emphasis).
“The design community needs to take over the discussion of LED from this point forward. The current efficiency and brightness of LED is sufficient for meeting lighting needs in most applications now. Future efficiencies will contribute additional cost reductions and system modifications; but “brightness” needs to disappear from our vernacular. The day of a 300 lumen/watt emitter is within feasibility; but that doesn’t mean that we will require that level of power for all applications. Technological improvements in efficiency should be encouraged, but we have the lumen packages to create amazing lighting designs today; let’s get back to being a lighting industry again.”
“A careful blend of old and new ideas is needed to accelerate the lighting renaissance.
There is no doubt SSL will change the future of the lighting world and, in turn, how our entire world is lit. Unfortunately, many individuals and companies within the lighting industry will not survive the change. They will be too slow to adapt and will simply lose their relevance and/or market share. But those who do survive the change – and especially those who move it forward on the design side – will reap the rewards. It is truly an exciting time to be alive and active in the lighting industry.” 
Mr. Konnerth certainly has gotten it right. LED is here, but the fixtures needed to make LED feasible for most applications are still evolving…somewhat slowly it seems. The knowledgeable consumer is a wise consumer.  
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