Cambridge scientists figure out way to make 60yr lightbulb cheaply

[fourier jr]

very cool. i wonder if there's a catch:

The researchers have designed a bulb that is three times more energy efficient than today's best offer and can cut lighting bills by 75 per cent.

The bulbs are made using Gallium Nitride (GaN), a man-made substance used in LEDs (light emitting diodes). It is routinely used in bike lights, mobile phones and camera flashes.

But until now the production costs have been too expensive for widespread use in homes and offices - a single bulb would have cost £20.

However, the researchers have found a cheaper technique to help manufacture the bulbs and manufacturers have begun work on production prototypes. The first units could hit shelves within two years.

Professor Colin Humphrey, head of the centre, said: "This could well be the holy grail in terms of providing our lighting needs for the future."

The bulbs are 12 times more efficient that conventional tungsten bulbs and three times more efficient than compact fluorescent "energy efficient" bulbs.

They can burn for 100,000 hours and they illuminate instantly and can be dimmed, unlike energy efficient bulbs.

If they were installed in every home and office the bulbs could cut the proportion of UK electricity used for lights from 20 per cent to 5 per cent a year.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/ea...-saving-lightbulb-that-last-for-60-years.html

 

[Cyrus]

This just in: manufacturers found that 60 year light bulbs don't work as claimed.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled: throw it away after a month and buy another one program.


lol. if I were a manufacturer, why the hell would I praise this?

 

[Gokul43201]

Long lifetime GaN LEDs are not new - they've been around for about a decade (and most of them haven't died yet).

I think the breakthrough is likely in the substrate material. So far, GaN on sapphire has worked well, but the sapphire substrates are not cheap. There are a bunch of groups that have been trying to grow GaN on a cheaper substrate (like Si). My first guess would be that's what the Cambridge group figured out.