Cree LED Revolution Blog

Cree and LED lighting are starting a revolution

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Energy Awareness Month 2011 Blog Series Wrap-Up

Monday, October 31st, 2011

Energy Awareness Month isn’t a Hallmark celebration (yet) but for us energy-efficiency gurus, it’s a great excuse to shout from the rooftops the importance of conserving energy. This year we decided to celebrate with a month-long blog series focusing on the ways Cree’s products and employees are working to help improve energy-efficiency.  

But sometimes life gets in the way of Energy Awareness Month, which means you may have *gasp* missed some of our posts. Well, don’t despair. We’ve rounded up all of our posts from this month and summarized them in a nice, neat little package just for you.

Cree Energy Awareness Month

WEEK ONE

In our first week we highlighted some of the utility companies that are offering rebates for Cree’s energy-efficient LED lighting products, as well as the EcoSmart LED Downlight we make for Home Depot. We broke down the types of rebates utilities offer, and we showed off some of the best including programs in Illinois, Long Island and New Jersey.

REBATE

Oct. 4 – Utility Companies Offer Rebates for Cree LED Lighting

Oct. 5 – ComEd Offers Illinois Customers Major Rebates on Cree LED Lighting

Oct. 6 – LIPA Brings LED Lighting Rebates to Lucky Long Island Residents

Oct. 7 – Fist Pump! Rebate Gives New Jersey Residents Opportunity to Buy EcoSmart LED Downlight for $24.97

WEEK TWO

Typically this blog focuses on LEDs and LED lighting, but we couldn’t pass up the chance to teach you a little about another side of Cree’s business: Our energy-saving power products! We were honored to have Cree Co-founder John Palmour explain how silicon carbide-based diodes can make power supplies and electric motors more efficient. And we offered a great intro to our Silicon Carbide MOSFETs.  We also slipped a power post into week three because we’re wild like that (see below).

power plant

Oct. 12 – The Power to Do More: Cree Silicon Carbide-Based Diodes Improve Efficiency of Power Systems

Oct. 13 – Cree’s Silicon Carbide MOSFETs Help Improve Efficiency of Electronics

WEEK THREE

In week three, we primarily focused on Cree LED lighting, showing you a couple examples of ways our LED lights are saving energy in places you might not think of such as Kentucky’s State Capitol rotunda and gas stations throughout the country. We reiterated the importance of knowing the difference between lumens and watts when shopping for LED lighting. And we had to a leftover post from our Power week about solar panels that we couldn’t let you miss, so we slipped it in.

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Oct. 17 – Get Il-lumen-ated with Lighting Facts: Knowing the Difference Between Lumens and Watts

Oct. 18 – Making Solar Panels More Efficient with Silicon Carbide Schottky Diodes

Oct. 19 – Kentucky State Capitol Rotunda Shines with Cree LED Lighting

Oct. 20 – Energy-Savings Surprises at Gas Stations

Oct. 21 – Spotlight on One of Cree’s R&D Engineers

WEEK FOUR

In week four, we focused on Cree LED components, showing you a variety of special places you can find them (from a solar-powered car to the University of Michigan’s Big House). We also told you about our investigative applications engineers and how Cree EasyWhite technology can make it easier for you to design with LEDs. And, our senior director of components marketing did an outstanding job explaining why Cree is completely rethinking lighting.

Photo by Andreas Peña Doll

Photo by Andreas Peña Doll

Oct. 28 – Why We Push for Revolution, Not Evolution

Oct. 27 – Solar Race Takes Cree LEDs “Down Under”

Oct. 26 – Get Your Game Face on with Cree LEDs

Oct. 25 – Cree Applications Engineers Investigate LEDs

Oct. 24 – Bye Bye Binning, Hello EasyWhite: How Cree’s EasyWhite Technology Simplifies Designing with LEDs

We hope you learned something about our commitment to making products that help conserve energy. Now don’t leave without checking out our LED-lit pumpkin carving contest.

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Posted in Cree, Energy Awareness Month, Energy Efficiency | No Comments »

Cree LED Contest Series: Family no longer hangs out in the dark

Monday, July 18th, 2011


We’re strong believers that if people can see quality LED lighting in action, they’ll want it. That’s because quality LED lighting is beautiful, very energy efficient, and can last a long time. What’s not to love?

So when we first launched our LED education portal, CreeLEDRevolution.com, we set out to makeover poorly-lit spaces through a monthly photo contest. The idea was to end the oppression of inferior lighting (or at least make a dent in it).

Since then we’ve awarded more than 100 Cree LED lights to homeowners and office workers from coast to coast. We followed up with the lucky winners to find out where they ended up using their Cree LED lights and what they think of them.

This week we will be highlighting follow-up interviews from some of the winners we heard back from. So stay tuned to our blog all week for stories from these LED revolutionaries. Here’s what you can expect:

TODAY: We check-in on our July 2010 winner who has developed a love for Cree LED lights.

TUESDAY: We see how the October 2010 winner made over his office and how a bathroom went from spooky to smiley.

WEDNESDAY: We revisit an energy professional who is using his LED lighting from the December 2010 contest to spread the good word.

THURSDAY: It’s not all about residential lighting. We revisit the February 2010 who shows us what LED lighting can do in a retail space.

FRIDAY: We’ll show you how LED lighting can even help a plein air painter. Confused? Stay tuned to see what our March 2010 winner did.

And if you want to be a winner too, hurry up and enter our July photo contest.

Entering is simple, just submit a photo of poor lighting in your home or office. Maybe you have CFLs that make everything in your kitchen look ghastly. Or maybe those incandescent lights in the den are sucking up too much energy and putting out too much heat. Each month our judges select one winner (and occasionally a runner-up) to receive five Cree CR6 LED downlights.

But you can’t win if you don’t enter. Submit your photo here. And read the full rules here.

And now, find out how winning our contest is changing the way one Idaho family lights its home:

July 2010 Winner Jerry Saltzer

It has been a year since Jerry Saltzer won our LED lighting giveaway, and in that time his love for LED lighting has grown so much that he has purchased eight more Cree LED lights.

“About half the canisters in the house are now equipped with Cree LEDs and I plan gradually to replace the rest,” Jerry wrote to me in a recent follow-up email.

That’s great news considering Jerry and his family were avoiding turning on lights in the living room and office because it was too much of a pain to change them when they burned out. The Idaho family won the July 2010 LED lighting giveaway after submitting this photo and explaining:

Jerry entered this photo to Cree's LED Lighting Contest.

Jerry entered this photo to Cree's LED Lighting Contest.

“The living room (and office) in our house is equipped with incandescent downlights in 16.5 foot ceilings,” Saltzer told me in an email. “The light they produce is fine, but replacing those light bulbs is such a big production that we are inclined to leave them off as much as possible and use floor and table lamps instead.”

Now the family doesn’t have to worry about that. In addition to replacing the energy-wasting incandescent downlights in his living room and office, Jerry says he has installed four Cree CR6 LED downlights in his kitchen. He has also installed four Cree LBR30 LED lamps in his stairwells.

And while it probably wasn’t oodles of fun dragging out the ladder to installing all of these new LED lights, Jerry gets to look on the bright side. Since his new Cree LED lights are designed to last 50,000 hours, he shouldn’t have to worry about changing these lights for years, even decades, to come.

If you want to put away your ladder for a long time, enter our July LED lighting photo contest. Simply submit a photo of poor lighting in your home or office that you would like to get rid of for good. One lucky winner will receive five Cree CR6 LED downlights.

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Posted in Contest Winners, Cree, Revolution | 5 Comments »

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!

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Posted in For Fun, Revolution | 1 Comment »

Cree CEO Chuck Swoboda joins Ben and Jerry in addressing North Carolina business leaders

Wednesday, May 19th, 2010

Cree CEO Chuck Swoboda had a tough act to follow Tuesday at the North Carolina CEO Forum. His keynote address was scheduled a few hours after the keynote delivered by Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield. Yes, that Ben & Jerry — the guys who brought us Cherry Garcia and Chubby Hubby. And as if speaking after the famed ice cream giants wasn’t tough enough, Ben and Jerry brought the entire audience ice cream for breakfast AND lunch!

BenandJerrysicecream

But when Chuck is passionate about something, it radiates when he speaks. So when he took the stage at the Raleigh Marriott City Center to address the room full of business leaders, I knew it would only be a few minutes before their minds would shift from ice cream to LED lights.

The forum’s topic was “The Triple Bottom Line: 21st Century Leadership in People, Planet and Profit.”   And sure enough, within minutes, Chuck was telling it straight to the audience, saying “the cleanest and cheapest energy is the energy we never use.” Then he explained that LED lighting is really all about energy-efficiency with the big bonus of actually making good business sense, since LED lights can save businesses money on energy and maintenance costs. Chuck told earlier speakers who were discussing purchasing carbon offsets that LED lighting could’ve saved them about 50 percent of what they spent since it uses so much less energy than traditional lighting.

By then, Chuck’s passion was evident and he started ragging on the 130-year-old incandescent light bulb. “About the only useful place for this is on a shelf in a museum,” Chuck said as he lifted an energy-wasting 75 Watt bulb in the air. “It’s going to be about as popular of an idea as records.”

Chuck touched on investor-owned utility companies, saying that utilities are not incentivized to sell less energy. “We need to change the incentive structure so they can make money saving energy,” Chuck said. He also spoke about the need for raising standards that regulate energy efficiency. Why, he asked, are buildings required to have insulation and yet it’s OK to screw in energy-sucking lights? Good question.

ChuckNCCEO

And when it comes to being a leader in LED lighting, Chuck didn’t shy away from telling the audience how Cree stays ahead of the pack.

“We listen to what people say we can’t do and, basically, we just go do that,” Chuck said. “It’s been a really exciting source of innovation for our company.”

So while Chuck didn’t dish out any ice cream, he definitely served up some inspiration. But you don’t have to take my word on it. People who were at the event and/or reading Tweets from the event felt the same way:

ChuckTweetsFinal2

A big thank you to the folks who organized this year’s N.C. CEO Forum. And if you were inspired to learn more about the LED Lighting Revolution, you can do it here.

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Posted in Revolution | 1 Comment »

California city once known as a getaway for Hollywood stars turns focus to sustainability

Tuesday, March 9th, 2010

Most people who visit Indian Wells, California, are probably drawn in by the four world class resorts, the spas and the lush golf courses. The resort community in the southern California desert became a retreat for celebrities after Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz opened the Indian Wells Hotel in 1958. Since then, city officials have worked to make Indian Wells a premiere destination in the Coachella Valley.

Indian Wells 009

These days, city officials are keen on sustainability, and energy-use reduction has become a key goal for the city. I had the “tough” job of visiting Indian Wells last month for an LED City® Council meeting, and while I was there I had the city’s management analyst Susan Weisbart give me a tour of some of the city’s LED lighting installations.

Indian Wells was the first California city to become an LED City. The LED City program helps municipalities speed up the adoption of energy-saving LED lights by connecting them with information they need to make informed decisions about installing LED lights.

One of the first LED lighting installations in Indian Wells involved swapping out incandescent lights that lit the outside of city hall and other municipal buildings with 12 Watt Cree LR6™ recessed lights. It’s a change that city officials say saves nearly $7,000 a year in energy costs. That’s not counting the maintenance savings of not having to replace burned out bulbs, since the LED lights they installed are designed to last 50,000 hours – or 17 years if they’re on 8 hours a day!

The city also has plans to replace the 50 Watt halogen lights illuminating the signature palm trees lining city streets with 11 Watt LED lights. Get this: The city estimates it can save $10,095 in energy costs per year once the project is complete!

Watch my LED tour and interview with Susan to see what Indian Wells is doing to save energy and money:

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Posted in LED Cities, Places Rocking LED Lights, Videos | 1 Comment »

Cree brings the LED Lighting Revolution home at the International Builders’ Show

Tuesday, January 19th, 2010

Take one look at our booth at the International Builders’ Show and you’ll see that we’re serious about bringing LED Lighting into your home.

IMG_0348

In the LED lighting biz, we often hear from people who say they bought an LED bulb at the grocery store and it stunk. As a result, they write off LED lighting as an expensive technology that doesn’t live up to its price tag, or billing.

At Cree, our hearts seriously break a little each time we hear that. Our booth at the International Builders’ Show explains why. You see, we’re making these gorgeous recessed LED lights that provide beautiful, warm color and are designed to last a crazy long time (50,000 hours). These LED lights are the real deal. They’re not too dim. They’re not bluish. They don’t flicker.

IMG_0347

Yet, like anything, it often only takes one bad apple to give everyone else a bad name. My co-worker Deb actually blogged today about the LED bulbs you can buy in the store that are supposed to be a 60-Watt equivalent.  Deb wrote: “Unfortunately, except for a few, they are mostly too dim or bluish, or worse, flicker and then go out for good.”

So we’re hoping that our booth at the International Builders’ Show will help SHOW people that LED lighting is ready for the home. It just depends on the type of LED lighting you use and how you use it.

IMG_0355

All the lights you see in these photos from our booth are Cree LED lights, and we think they’re beautiful. True, they’re not light bulbs that you would screw into your desk lamp, but they provide very efficient overhead lighting for your home. And that, my friends, makes our hearts sing.

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Posted in Trade Shows | 2 Comments »

North Carolina’s first green McDonald’s uses LED Lights (and cotton, bamboo, recycled glass and more)

Tuesday, January 5th, 2010

Take a quick look at one McDonald’s in Cary, NC, and you might not guess that it’s different than every other McDonald’s in North Carolina. But step inside and you’ll see why this McDonald’s in the Saltbox Village shopping center is making history.

The restaurant is the first green McDonald’s in the state, on track to receive its LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council later this month. (Take a look at the 25+ year-old McDonald’s v. the new one. Approximately 99 percent of the debris generated by the demolition process was diverted from landfills by either being reused or recycled).

CaryMcDonaldsOldNewCaryMcdonalds

I recently visited the restaurant to chat with franchise owner Ric Richards about why he chose LED lights to light up 97 percent of the store. Turns out the LED lights in his store consume 78 percent less electricity compared to a standard lighting package at other McDonald’s restaurants.

The restaurant was designed to take advantage of natural light and uses a fully automated, intelligent lighting-control system that combines light from Cree LED lighting and daylighting from Solatube skylights. There’s even a photo sensor to maintain the proper light levels on work surfaces. So, if it’s rainy and overcast outside, the LED light levels are increased to compensate. And since the system is automated, it’s not up to an employee to notice the changing light levels and fool around with the switches. How cool is that?!

Of course, there are many other neat steps taken to use green technologies, and there’s even a touchscreen video kiosk at the front of the store that shows off some of technologies. Here’s a video featuring some of the neat building materials used in construction and my interview with Ric about the energy-efficient LED lights:

Stay tuned, we’ll be updating you soon on the official LEED certification of Ric’s franchise.

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Posted in LED Businesses, Places Rocking LED Lights, Videos | 4 Comments »

Introducing the Cree LED Lighting Revolution blog

Wednesday, November 18th, 2009

As leaders of the LED Lighting Revolution, we find that many people are in the dark about energy-efficient LED lighting. We’re working hard to change that, and we hope our spiffy new blog will help. So thanks for stopping by. We’ll pause for a few seconds while you subscribe to our RSS feed. (One-one-thousand, two-one-thousand, three-one-thousand …)

Good, you’re back. Now … on to revolutionary things!

To understand the Cree LED Lighting Revolution, you may have to change your mind set about lighting and LEDs in general. You see, for a long time people said LEDs weren’t a viable source for general lighting.

GinnyTradeshowBooth2

LEDs were long relegated to indicator lights: They lit traffic signals and the speedometer on your car’s dashboard. Then LEDs were used to backlight things like cell phones and TVs. And they were also used to cast colored light in fountains and on buildings. And the LEDs did a great job.

But in recent years, LEDs have found their way into a slew of lighting fixtures used in businesses, parking garages, streets, homes and more. And you know what? LED lights are more energy efficient than many other light sources, including the classic incandescent bulb, really hot halogens and even those toxic stop-gaps, CFLs.

LED lights require up to 85 percent less energy than light bulbs and up to 50 percent less energy than fluorescent tubes. And LEDs are capable of producing beautiful light. Cree LED lights are being used in the Pentagon and there are plans to install them in 650 Walmart stores in the produce and electronics sections. In fact, there are LED lights in a lot of places.

Bad lighting habits can’t be broken if no one understands the alternatives. The Cree LED Lighting Revolution is dedicated to teaching you more about the technology and showing off real-life examples of LED lights.

So follow me, Cree blogger Ginny Skalski, and take a stand against bad lighting. Join the LED Lighting Revolution and subscribe to our blog for more updates. Thanks!

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Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »