LED technology, how far can/will it go?

I am very new to this game, the game being "light tools". I am astounded by the current crop of emitters/light engines that are available for pocket change. Now one can snag a CUSTOM host with a spec'd emitter for ~150 bucks that absolutely stomps a mid 1990s top-of-the-line light that would have cost ~200$ 1990 dollars. WOW. It's a quiet revolution that I think is sliding by the general public. Yeah, we see HIDs in some cars, and a few automakers are tinkering with LED main lights, but overall LED tech is kinda "meh....yeah they are okay". I'm pretty stoked at the idea that my wee little S-Mini can punch out 300+ lumens for over two hours and still nestle in my pocket comfortably, and it's not as efficient as many other models/brands. This is some seriously cool technology.

Computers have followed Moore's law closely, doubling computer power every two years or so. Can we expect to see the output of LEDs to follow a similar path, or is making photons bounce around more of a zero sum game? In twenty years will someone be changing my diaper with a 10k lumen light that runs off static electricity generated by simply walking around, or is there a threshold for light vs. energy?

Interesting question. I am no expert in this field, but I still have to comment on this!

I guess the limit of lighting technology would be when an emitter can transfer the energy into light with no loss or heat etc.

I don't know the ultimate answer to your question about what lighting technology will be in use at your retirement facility but LEDs are already an example of an aspect of Moore's Law and have been since they became a practical electronic component in the early 1960s. Although Moore's Law originally described the doubling approximately every 18 to 24 months of the number of transistors that can be placed inexpensively on an integrated circuit it has taken on a broader meaning and is now linked to other types of digital electronic devices in regard to memory capacity, processing speed and even the number and size of pixels on digital camera sensors. As semiconductors, LEDs have been on the same path. In the beginning they were available only in red and were only bright enough to be used as replacements for incandescent and neon display indicator lamps and they were extremely expensive. A short time later, they were introduced in seven segment displays (digital clock and calculator numerals). Eventually, as LED materials technology advanced their efficiencies and brightness increased, and other colors were developed which ultimately led to the high brightness LED's used in today's flashlights. Of course, these advances were a result of processing optimization that also dramatically lowered prices per unit.

Actually, LEDs have their own counterpart to Moore's Law known as Haitz's Law which states that every decade, the cost per lumen (unit of useful light emitted) falls by a factor of 10, and the amount of light generated per LED package increases by a factor of 20, for a given wavelength (color) of light.

Both Moore's Law and Haitz's Law describe trends and as such they are thought to have finite limits.

How fast and far LED's will go remains to be seen but continuing the trend, LEDs are expected to become the most efficient light source within the next 10 years.

P.S. This thread seems to be in the wrong forum and probably should be moved over to the LED forum.

Well if an ideal black body emitter in the 'white' light spectrum is 250lm/w, then aren't we almost half way there already?

No. A black body emits all kinds of radiation all over the spectrum. That takes a lot of energy that doesn't contribute much to lumen count. LEDs have a more limited distribution of energy. If my recollection is correct, at a 555 nm wavelength, 100% efficiency is somewhere around 680 lumens per watt. Of course, having white light means more than just pure green light and so the level would be lower.

I'm not sure about the future total output of light's but I think we will see the biggest leaps in battery's and hopefully efficiency. Right now I can carry around a pocket light that outputs 500lms for 2hrs, hopefully in the future I will carry around 650lmns for 6hrs in that same sized light.

With the release of the XM-L almost any light that uses it is plenty bright for me and in some cases much more brighter than I had anticipated in just a few years so now I find myself looking more at runtime and regulation, battery technology is where we need to look.

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This is why I specified only in the spectrum of 'white' light, say 4300-6000k, which I thought was 250lm/W, though this could definitely be incorrect.

I think the real future for LED efficiency is when we can produce white light without the need for phosphor. That's where we lose a lot of efficiency right now.

Not long ago we thought blue LED's were impossible. Once we can shed the need for phosphor to create white light, we can have wider spectrum emitters and far less light lost to heat and lost in the down-converting of blue light to yellow.

So, to sum it all up, we can say that in the future we can count and focus on improving battery efficiency and finding a way to produce LEDs that produce the whole light spectrum. Correct?

Personally, I too want to focus on the production of LEDs that can emit the whole spectrum.

Maybe LED technology will be replaced by something better. I just saw this link on this thread posted by "parnass". This video clip, entitled Flashlight Experiment LEP vs LED, implies that plasma technology could replace LEDs.

Interesting.

Arcus Diabolus said:

Personally, I too want to focus on the production of LEDs that can emit the whole spectrum.

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X-Ray too? You're either a perv or you work for TSA :devil:

beerwax said:

i believe that there is also another law, that needs a good name, that says that for every increase in led lumen output there is an at least parallel increase in the minimum acceptable EDC brightness level. or to put it another way we used to carry 30 lumens, now we need 500 lumens in the pocket.

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There actually is a law that one could apply here to some degree even though you mention this in a tongue & cheek comment about EDC cravings. It was proposed by Ray Kurzweil, and is known as The Law of Accelerating Returns which states that "history of technology shows that technological change is exponential" and argued for extending Moore's Law to describe exponential growth of diverse forms of technological progress.

Well, of course we all want the newest, latest, bestest! The only problem with rapidly accelerating technology is the ability to keep up buying it. :sigh: As consumers we crave the rewards of these rapidly accelerating trends of technology. (Sounds like there's really another law in there somewhere, but beerwax will have to propose the name.)

Norm said:

Moved to General Flashlight Discussion.
Norm

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Norm, I hope you don't mind my comment here, but considering the OP's specific reference to the future of LED technology in regard to Moore's Law and the title of the thread, "LED technology, how far can/will it go?", are you sure this thread belongs in the General Flashlight Discussion and not the LED Forum?

Eh, perhaps it doesn't really matter but I decided I would ask.

Respectfully,
EZO

trying to stay with the thread, but bringing in other facets. My city changed to LED traffic lights over ten years ago for an appreciable savings in time, labor and materials over constantly changing incan. light bulbs. The government is already realized that CFLs are not the solution to home lighting due to disposal problems etc, and are now pushing led replacement "bulbs" for home lamps. Right now they are relatively expensive, even taking the longevity into consideration. They are being used for tail lights on cars, tail and running lights on trailers such as semis and boat and travel trailers. I feel we will see more and more penetration into daily life, not just in our EDCs and other work lights.

menoceros said:

trying to stay with the thread, but bringing in other facets. My city changed to LED traffic lights over ten years ago for an appreciable savings in time, labor and materials over constantly changing incan. light bulbs. The government is already realized that CFLs are not the solution to home lighting due to disposal problems etc, and are now pushing led replacement "bulbs" for home lamps. Right now they are relatively expensive, even taking the longevity into consideration. They are being used for tail lights on cars, tail and running lights on trailers such as semis and boat and travel trailers. I feel we will see more and more penetration into daily life, not just in our EDCs and other work lights.

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They're also being used more and more as headlights and aux. lights on military vehicles. Some of the lights are the Vision-X type of circular lights with approx 10 LED's. Others are 2 or 3 LEDs with a massive optic in front of them. They appear to light well out to about 50 yards (though with the glare, you're covering your eyes at 200 yards). I assume it'll be a matter of a few years before civilian headlights start drifting that way, as we're already seeing some aux lights being offered for off-roading.

I think I read somewhere a few years ago that battery technology was the limiting factor in electronics and anything else that requires batteries. I don't remember the details (unfortunately) and I knew very little about batteries really but there were certain limiting factors in battery technology that would not lead us to expect large increases as we have with other technology.

Maybe it just had to do with physics and there being no free lunch but my take on the article was that improvements in battery technology would be very small and incremental.

gcbryan said:

I think I read somewhere a few years ago that battery technology was the limiting factor in electronics and anything else that requires batteries. I don't remember the details (unfortunately) and I knew very little about batteries really but there were certain limiting factors in battery technology that would not lead us to expect large increases as we have with other technology.

Maybe it just had to do with physics and there being no free lunch but my take on the article was that improvements in battery technology would be very small and incremental.

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Battery tech is one limiting factor. Alkalines and nimh are not really improving in long term usable capacity and lithium based battery improvements are rather small and slow coming I figure a new chemistry could help things or new battery technology perhaps. I to know that electronics that require memory and microcircuitry are improving by shrinking the die size the power consumption keeps going down to such levels that things like a 1 AAA radio that runs for 30 hours is possible when most radios used to take 4D cells years back.

Posters to this thread have touched on various ancillary topics like flashlights, batteries, and other related issues but in keeping with the OPs actual title, "LED technology, how far can/will it go?", the question primarily seems to be, how bright will LEDs eventually get and at what efficiency? Indeed, there are other factors such as R&D budgets, marketplace requirements and demands, costs, power supply issues, and others.

For anyone who feels like taking the time to read an interesting and informative 13 page paper from 2010 by two industry professionals on this very topic titled, "Solid-state lighting: 'The case' 10 years after and future prospects", (27 SEP 2010) - you can find it in PDF format HERE or HTML format HERE.

It makes for some very interesting reading as both authors don't entirely agree but they do feel that the demands of the marketplace will ultimately determine "how far will it go" and they provide a lot of fascinating and detailed background, history, facts, theory and opinion.

In fact, they conclude their paper with a remarkable last paragraph that predicts the end of the revolution in electric lighting that began 130 years ago with the introduction of the Edison bulb as SSL (Solid State Lighting) achieves the required efficiencies; which isn't too far off!

"Since Edison's first installation of electric lights over 130 years ago, the industry developed half a dozen new electricity-based lighting technologies, each improving efficacy, cost, or quality of light. Over the next decade SSL will approach the end of the efficacy ladder and meet or exceed the market's needs with respect to cost and quality. There will be little room left to justify the substantial investments needed to develop an alternative newer technology. The series of revolutions in lighting covering the entire history of mankind from campfire to candles to light bulbs to SSL will come to an end. The revolutions in lighting will be over!"

Certainly LED lighting will be with us for a long time to come, but personally, I find it hard to fully accept the above statement, if only because of the number of times down through history when such broad and finite predictions have been proven wrong. Technology has a unique way of surprising us. How many have unexpectedly ended up in the dust bin? I am sure that those who made the transition from burning candles to whale lamps and then to gas lamps couldn't foresee the eventual paradigm shifting invention of the lightbulb and the development of electrical power and those that adopted the lightbulb didn't foresee Solid State Lighting. As one example OLED (granted, another form of SSL but not mentioned in the article) is in its very earliest stages of development and many years from now OLED or perhaps another technology may supplant LEDs for reasons other than or in addition to efficiency or cost. OLED, like LEDs were initially developed with other uses in mind than as general lighting devices so the idea that R&D will not be focused on lighting could be off the mark. Our lives are filled with so many accidental or unintended inventions and technological breakthroughs they are hard to count. I have a hunch that the field of nanotechnology will yield some astonishing advances in materials science that we cannot even begin to imagine today and that lighting technology will be one of the places it will leave its mark. Just my opinion. Anyway, I'm still digesting the lengthy and interesting article and it is definitely worth taking the time to read it.