What happens when you enroll your teenager in summer Energy Camp?

Tuesday, July 13th, 2010

There’s a lot more to summer camp these days than doing crafts and building fires. At North Carolina State University in Raleigh, NC, students can sign up for Design Camp, Football Camp, Science Camp and even Energy Camp. You read that right – Energy Camp.

The NCSU College of Engineering offers a variety of summer camps, including a camp where students learn about the different forms of energy and how to conserve it.

And, of course, we love the idea of Energy Camp. After all, Cree’s products —  from Schottky diodes, to our LED components and LED fixtures — are designed to do more with less energy. And, what’s more, Cree’s history is rooted in N.C. State’s materials science and engineering lab. That’s where our company’s founders first began working together on research that would later lead them to form Cree.

I had a chance to visit the NCSU Energy Camp a couple of weeks ago and sit in on the students’ lessons on LEDs. Here’s a video recap shot by yours truly:

New York-based Design firm wins the June LED Lighting contest

Thursday, July 8th, 2010

The lobby of Stressdesign may look modern and chic, but look closer and you’ll see that the Syracuse, New York-based Design firm is actually employing some pretty ancient technology – incandescent lighting!

Stressdesign president Marc Stress wanted to improve the lighting in his office, so he snapped a photo and submitted it to our monthly photo contest. Today, we’re pleased to announce that he is the June winner and will receive five Cree LED lights to replace the halogens heating up his workspace.

Here’s his winning picture and what he wrote about the lighting:

“We have a mix of incandescent and CFL lamps in our office. The CFLs are inconsistent at best, and all the incandescent lamps (add) to heat and $$$ on utility.”

lobby photo

This was the winning photo for the month of June.

I e-mailed Marc to tell him the good news. He opted to receive the Cree LRP-38 ™ light which will replace the 75W Halogens that hang from tracks over the office.

Some facts about the Cree LRP-38 lights that Marc is receiving:

  • The LRP-38 consumes only 11 Watts, while producing light comparable to a 75W incandescent.
  • It’s designed to last 50,000 hours. That means Stressdesign could leave the lights on for eight hours a day, seven days a week for just over 17 years.
  • But these lights won’t burn out instantly at the end of their life, like the incandescents Marc is currently burning.  Cree’s LED lights are designed to provide at least 70 percent of their initial light output at the 50,000 hour mark. Many different factors (such as fixture design and operating conditions like temperature and current) determine the actual lifetime of an LED fixture or bulb.
  • The light quality is beautiful. The LRP-38 light delivers warm light (2700K) and gorgeous color (achieving 90 out of 100 on the color rendering index).

Marc said he can’t wait to bring LED lighting to his Design firm.

“I’ve been using LED lighting solutions in various applications in my home and office for the past 5-7 years. I’ve used them for guide lighting, ambient lighting and supplemental area lighting. Early attempts were novel in their power savings, but light output and quality was lacking,” Marc wrote to me.

“Lately, I’ve noticed a huge jump in lumen output, CRI quality and lamping options. I am expecting the new Cree lamps to exceed expectations and provide a better alternative to CFL lamps,” he added.

If you want to give Cree LED lighting a try in your home or office, enter our July photo contest. To qualify for our giveaway, all you have to do is submit a photo of bad lighting to our site. We could be featuring you next month on our blog.

Grote’s work lamp road tour features LED-loving super heroes

Thursday, July 1st, 2010

Seeing is believing when it comes to lighting. So if the folks at Indiana-based Grote Industries sent you an e-mail saying their LED work lamps were stunning, it probably wouldn’t have the same impact as if they set up the lights in your driveway and switched them on.

So Grote is taking its new LED WhiteLight Work Lamps to the streets, literally. Earlier this month, Grote hit the highway for an 80-plus city tour in a truck adorned with LED-loving Super Heroes dubbed Team Trilliant, named after the company’s Trilliant LED WhiteLight Technology.  Take a look:

RoadShowVehicle1

This truck features 34 exterior work lamps all lit with Cree X-Lamp® XR-E LEDs. The tricked out truck will travel west across the northern United States and parts of Canada this summer then head south during its return leg in the fall and winter, according to a Grote press release.

It’s definitely a different way for a manufacturer of vehicle safety systems to reach its audience. Grote officials say they redirected resources traditionally aimed at industry trade shows to pursue the tour. The tour also features a mobile theater, giving visitors a chance to learn more about the advantages of LED work lights where ever the truck stops.

trilliant

So if work lamps are your thing, check out the Trilliant Technology Tour map to see if it’s stopping by a city near you.

April LED Lighting contest winner will light up his Hawaiian-themed coffee shop

Thursday, May 27th, 2010

Charlie Trinh was surfing the Internet looking for “green products” when he found CreeLEDRevolution.com. The Houston, Texas resident says he saw our monthly photo contest and decided to give it a try.

“I needed brighter lights for my business,” Charlie said in an e-mail to me. He owns a coffee shop with a Hawaiian theme. “I want to convert over to LED lights but I would like to sample it out first before buying.”

Well, lucky for Charlie, he was the winner for our April LED lighting giveaway. He submitted this very dark photo of the counter at his coffee shop. This dark photo won Charlie five Cree LRP-38™ LED lights. His new 11 Watt LED lights are designed to last 50,000 hours, which means he could leave them on for eight hours a day, 365 days a year and they could last 17 years! And did I mention that would be an 85% percent energy savings if he replaced electricity-sucking incandescent?

April contest LED lighting winner

“That was my coffee shop with all the lights on, and it was still dark,” Charlie wrote.

We’re excited to bring LED lights into Charlie’s life and business. Prior to winning these lights he said his only experience with LED lights was with his LED flashlight. (You may recall that was also the case for Fargo, ND homeowner Dave Hultin).

Are you jealous of Charlie’s new energy-efficient Cree LED lights? Don’t be. Just enter our monthly photo contest for your chance to win five of your own. All you have to do is take a photo of bad lighting in your home, office, business, etc. and submit it here.

Seriously, I bet you can do that in five minutes. And spending five minutes to snap and upload a picture seems like a good use of time if it means you have a chance to win five Cree LED lights. Ready, Set, Go!

Happy 25th Birthday, CFL. Your days are numbered.

Wednesday, April 14th, 2010

Did you know the CFL is celebrating its 25th birthday this year? We just found out from the folks at Sylvania, who plan to commemorate the occasion tomorrow at Light + Building, the big lighting tradeshow happening this week in Frankfurt, Germany.

To its credit, the CFL has come a long way since it was born in 1985. Its average life span doubled, its size shrunk considerably, it got cheaper and there’s less mercury inside. But it still has mercury inside, which means if it ever breaks, you can’t just sweep up the glass and be on your way. You’re supposed to follow these steps, which include airing out the room, washing or even throwing out materials that come in contact with the broken bulb and more.

CFL BIRTHDAY

But we’re realists. We realize the CFL – for all its toxic faults – still consumes less energy than the 130+ year old incandescent bulb. So we’re not going to crash the CFL’s birthday party because, frankly, this may be the last year folks show up to celebrate.

The CFLs days are numbered. The LED Lighting Revolution is gaining traction because most LED lights consume even less energy than CFLs and they do so without containing toxic mercury. LED lights are designed to last significantly longer than CFLs. And LED lights reach full brightness immediately.

And I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking: “It’s not really fair of you to rain on the CFL parade when I can’t even buy a 60 Watt equivalent LED bulb at the store.” To that I say touché, and then I’ll duly note that there are plenty of other LED lighting products made by Cree and other companies that can successfully replace incandescent and fluorescent lights. And innovations are happening all the time.

So happy birthday, CFL. Sorry we can’t make it to your party, but we’re busy Lighting the LED Revolution.

Creative LED lighting design contest winners show us what’s possible

Thursday, April 1st, 2010

We’re so focused on lighting businesses, offices and homes with energy-efficient LED lights, that we don’t often take time to show off other cool applications for LEDs. But that doesn’t mean we don’t support using LEDs in other ways.

Take a look at some of these creative ways that university students in China came up with to use LEDs in our first creative LED lighting contest:

LED light Samples 1

Nearly 1,000 students representing about 100 universities in China submitted hundreds of design entries. Fifty designs were chosen for the final round of judging and the winner received US $3,000, with runners up snagging $1,500 for their creative designs. 

The entries were judged based on creativity, practicality, marketability, LED performance, artistic quality and energy efficiency. The first place prize went to a project called “Lighting to Share,” which used a magnetic effect to form different lighting modes, emphasizing lighting effects and LED lighting features. It was submitted by Huang Jiongzhang, Du Weizheng and Ni Yujun from Taiwan’s National Cheng Kung University. Here’s a pic of the winning entry:

LED Winner

Sure, these unique LED lighting projects might never light your house, but we’re hoping that contests like this will help  show what can be done with LEDs and will inspire even more LED lights in the future.

Chocolate bunny melts under incandescent light, survives LED light

Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

I was one of the most popular people at work this week after word spread that I was melting chocolate bunnies with light bulbs. People kept stopping by my desk to ask if the scuttlebutt was true. And when they found out it was true, several co-workers declared that I have the best job ever.

But I wasn’t melting the bunnies for fun, or even for a snack. This experiment was for the sake of the LED lighting revolution.

I can preach the benefits of energy-efficient LED lighting until my voice goes hoarse (which I’ve done) or type out blog posts, tweets and e-mails until my fingers callous. But, let’s face it, seeing is believing.

So I turned an empty office into a studio for my experiment. I placed chocolate Easter bunnies under a 12 Watt Cree LRP-38 and a 65 Watt incandescent floodlight. Both lights are designed to be hung from tracks. And, despite their Wattage differences, they’re a relatively fair comparison — a 12 Watt LRP-38 can replace Halogen bulbs up to 90 Watts (the folks at Furniture Row in Denver, Colorado replaced one thousand 90 W Halogens with LRP-38s).

Here's the setup.

Here's the setup.

The results were exactly what I expected. The bunny under the incandescent light melted into a pool of chocolate that spilled over the plate and onto the desk. The LED bunny kept his shape, with just the tip of his head becoming soft when I touched it with my fingertip. Watch the time lapse video to see the incandescent bunny’s downfall:

 

Once the incandescent bunny collapses, you can see my hand reach over and reposition the plate. That’s because that sucker fell backwards and out of the video shot, so I had to reposition him so we could all watch him melt.

I hope the video conveys how much more energy-efficient LED lights are. Since LED lights consume significantly less energy than incandescent bulbs (and even compact fluorescents), they don’t emit as much heat. In fact, LEDs are sensitive to heat, that’s why good thermal design is important for a long-lasting LED light, and that’s what the heat sink helps accomplish (the metal fins or slots that surround LED lights).

Hmmm. Perhaps I’ll have to start melting chocolate with light bulbs around every holiday. If you’ve got suggestions of what I should melt next, post them in the comments!

High Definition screens at American Airlines Center put HD in every seat

Friday, March 26th, 2010

I’ve been known to jump up and down or wave my scarf at hockey games in hopes of being projected on the big screen in between plays. But if I ever attend a Dallas Stars game, I’d probably check my hair and makeup before I attempted to attract the cameras.

That’s because the American Airlines Center now features high definition screens, which means Dallas Stars and Dallas Mavericks fans can now experience HD in every seat. And let’s face it, few people would enjoy being projected in HD in front of a stadium full of people with Alfalfa hair! But how awesome would it be to follow game highlights in HD (especially if your seats are in the nosebleed section).

I know we focus closely on the LED lighting revolution – helping the world ditch its addiction to incandescent and fluorescent bulbs. But our LEDs are also used in some other neat applications, and when I hear about uses such as these massive HD screens, I have to share them!

Here are some pictures:

American2

AmericanLED

So how many Cree LEDs are used to light the 25 individual screens at the American Airlines Center? 13 million. Pretty incredible, huh?

Cree goes to SXSW Interactive: Find us for chance to win LED lights!

Wednesday, March 10th, 2010

I have two geek sides. One is my LED side, where I get excited geeking out over color temperatures, efficacy and CRI. The other is my social media side, where I geek out over Twitter, blogging and APIs.

Later this week, I’ll get to focus on my social media geek side as I join some 11,000 fellow passionate Internet users in Austin, Texas, at South by Southwest Interactive, the largest web, interactive and social media conference of the year.

lrp38

Here's a look at the LED lights you could win! We're giving away 3 LRP-38s!

I have a lot of goals for the conference, one of them being to spread the good word about the LED Lighting Revolution to anyone who will listen (feel sorry for the person stuck next to me on the plane).

If you plan to attend SXSWi, find me! I’ll be tweeting my location periodically (you are following @Cree on Twitter, aren’t you?). And I’ll be at the Cree Sustainable Media Happy Hour, presented by our friends over at TriplePundit and EcoPopTV on Monday, March 15.

If you’ll be in Austin on Monday and you want to socialize with other non-profits, social entrepreneurs, issues bloggers, clean techies, environmental filmmakers and North Carolina peeps, let us know you’re coming.

And at any point during SXSWi, if you find me, give me your business card. Once SXSWi is over, we’ll draw one winner to receive three Cree LRP-38® LED lights. These are the same LED lights that are being installed in the produce sections of 650 Wal-Marts and they provide gorgeous, warm energy-efficient light!

It shouldn’t be too hard to find me throughout the week. I plan on tweeting my location and using the location-based app Gowalla. Here’s a picture of me from last night’s News & Observer Tweetup in Downtown Raleigh. Find me for your chance to win!

GinnyNandoTweetup
Looking forward to Lighting the LED Revolution in Austin!

Do you hate fluorescent lighting as much as I do?

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010

I hate fluorescent lighting. I always have. I once worked at a company that had a horrible conference room lit with ugly fluorescent lighting, and every time I was summoned to a meeting in there, I would turn off the lights. Better to work by the light of our computer screens, I reasoned, then to drown in a greenish fluorescent bath. No one ever asked me to leave the lights on, so I guess my colleagues hated the lights too.

My disdain for mercury-laden fluorescent lighting has grown even stronger since I started working for a company that makes LED lighting. That’s because I now sit in an office lit by beautiful, dimmable LED lights and it’s pretty nice. I’ve never felt the need to switch off the lights here. I’ve also learned a lot about the downsides of fluorescent lighting: the headaches, migraines, eye strain and discomfort those icky lights can trigger in some people thanks to their notorious, sometimes subtle, sometimes painfully obvious flicker.

I must admit that even though I’m not a fan of fluorescent lights, they are more efficient than energy-sucking incandescent lights. But they also contain toxic mercury. Sadly, a lot of people don’t realize you’re not supposed to toss CFLs in garbage. There are special ways you’re supposed to dispose of CFLs (and all fluorescent lights) so you don’t muck up landfills with mercury.

Of course I crave the day when everyone will get to live, work and shop under energy-efficient LED lights. But until then, it’s comforting to know I’m not alone in hating fluorescents. A quick Twitter search of “fluorescent lights” shows a slew of disparaging comments about the lights. Some from the past week are so amusing I have to share them:

flurochain1

If you’re sick of fluorescent lighting too, then become a fan of “Banishing Ugly Fluorescent Lighting” on facebook. I’m not sure it will make a difference, but it always feels good to complain in the comfort of other like-minded people.

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