Philips Reveals World's Best LED with 200 Lumens Per Watt

Philips announced their latest LED lamp prototype on April 11, 2013. The lamp produces 200 lumens per watt, which is twice as efficient as conventional LEDs and TL2, both which produce 100 lumens per watt. This means that it produces twice the amount of light for the same amount of energy, or emits the same amount of light using half the energy. This breaks previous records for LED efficiency, because it is the first time that efficiencies of this level have been achieved without sacrificing light quality. It will still produce the warm, white light that is comfortable for users.

While high LED efficiencies of this caliber have been produced by researchers, this is the first time that a lamp with this efficiency and high quality light will be manufactured commercially. Philips expects to begin selling the lamps for office and commercial use in 2015 before manufacturing residential models.

Philips' discovery will have a significant and lasting impact on the lighting industry, and potentially on global energy use. According to Philip's video about the new technology, lighting makes up 19% of the world's energy use. If the world switched to 100% LED lighting, it would cut global electricity consumption by 40%, though with Philips' new levels of efficiency, it could save even more. In the United States, if all fluorescent lights were replaced with Philip's 200 lumen/watt LEDs, it would save about 100 terawatt hours annually, which would save $12 billion and prevent the release of 60 million metric tons of CO_2.

Once Philips releases the technology, it will drive the remainder of the energy efficient lighting market, which will have to compete with the company's high quality, super efficient lighting. While we have a couple of years to actually purchase the LEDs, I predict we will see a shift to higher efficiency in the industry even sooner.