LED Lighting Iowa

A new light is about to break on the horizon of residential illumination: light emitting diodes, or LEDs. They have been used for years in indicator, electronic readout, and signage applications, as well as in the theater industry. More recently, LEDs have seen increasing use as architectural accents in high-end homes. In the not-so-distant future, LED technology will move out of this niche and will take over general home lighting duty, according to industry experts.

“LEDs offer a nice alternative to folks who both want to save energy but also want great lighting in their home, and want to have lighting that shows off their home,” points out Kevin Dowling, vice president of innovation for Color Kinetics.

The key to LEDs achieving general-use status will be manufacturers' ability to develop a high-efficacy white-light LED with warm tones, which the industry has been focusing on to replicate the glow of incandescent light, because that is what homeowners find most desirable. LEDs have great potential to close the gap between the efficiency of fluorescents and the warmth of incandescents, according to Ron Mascenti, marketing director for enLux LED. Already LED technology can provide warm white lights that use less energy than incandescents, but most still cannot match the efficacy of cool-white LEDs—which tend to have a blue or green cast—or of many fluorescents. However, continuous improvements are being made.

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