LED: new wonders In light technology 

COMPACT fluorescent lamps, (CFL) move over. 

CFL may be hip, but in the near future, modern light technologies would be led by light-emitting diodes (LED). 

LED may soon be the best eco-solution to the world’s power problems, agreed scientists from the government energy department. 

At least, this too was what a senior science research specialist at the Department of Energy (DOE) thinks and revealed during an quick press conference at Alumar Island off Getafe town November 25. 

To prove his point, DOE’s Magdaleno Baclay Jr. explained that while 7-watt compact fluorescent lamp is many times brighter than incandescent lamp and saves enough energy, a much smaller LED produces the same brightness at an even smaller wattage. 

He said LED is eight times brighter than a conventional lamp of the same wattage and LED is twice as bright as the compact fluorescent lamp of the same wattage. 

This means that if a household uses five 100-watt bulbs, it uses about.5 kilowatts per hour. On a five hour continuous use, say between six to 11 pm, some 2.5 kilowatts would be used. 

At the current rate of P5.00 per kilowatt, the consumption amounts approximately to P12.5 per night. 

But it that household changes to five 15-watts CFL, which has approximately the same brightness as the 100 watts incandescent light, the power consumption is cut in half as a simple computation would show. 

On the other hand, if that same household switches to LED lights, a 7-watt LED can go as bright as the equivalent of a 20 watts CFL or 100 watts incandescent bulb. 

Imagine the savings and the cut in energy use, Engr. Baclay points out. 

In fact, while LED lights are not as economically viable as of now, studies are in to craft LED lights using new and available technologies at the University of San Carlos, in Cebu, Baclay added. 

While not yet commercially marketing their invention, USC LED sources have already loaned 10-watt led lights in the form of CFLs to Alumar residents who have seen the wisdom of controlling their power consumption even as their source of energy is infinite. (racPIABohol)