Return of incandescent light bulbs as MIT makes them more efficient than LEDs
Researchers at MIT have shown that by surrounding the filament with a special crystal structure they can bounce back the energy which is usually lost
EXCERPT: Ever since the EU restricted sales of traditional incandescent light bulbs, homeowners have complained about the shortcomings of their energy-efficient replacements.
The clinical white beam of LEDs and frustrating time-delay of ‘green’ lighting has left many hankering after the instant, bright warm glow of traditional filament bulbs.
But now scientists in the US believe they have come up with a solution which could see a reprieve for incandescent bulbs.
Some years ago, if memory serves, they took a regular incandescent and put a small glass secondary envelope inside, around the filament, which had special coatings to help trap the heat and reflect it back onto the filament while letting out the visible light. This sounds similar but perhaps with newer and more efficient technology.
Given todays level of technology, this one may be doable in large scale production. If claims hold true and this actually does come to fruition, the huge advantages over LED’s for the consumer would be a quantum leap forward:
far greater efficiency
lower production costs
no heat sinking requirements
can be used in existing enclosed fixtures without overheating the light source.
high CRI while remaining efficient
All that said, I suspect it will still have the limited life span of an incandescent. Advantage LED.
Much more technical info here:
Adding substantial credit of feasibility from this excerpt:
“The work was supported by the Army Research Office through the MIT Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies, and the S3TEC Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy.”
I’m always a bit skeptical of the breakthroughs MIT’s PR department announces by press release.
If you look back and find any of the interesting, try emailing the PR department and ask where to find the subsequent progress report on it.
Don’t hold your breath, though, waiting for a response.
I’m always for the dreamers who look for such as this and make it workable, but until it becomes practical, available, and economical I’ll just sit back and watch.
There have been many claims of ‘world-beaters’ through history that didn’t make it in reality, and darn few which proved their worth with success.
Got to beg to differ on the credibility, this just means they had to hit up two different arms of government financing to get enough funds to make this work. They hire grant writers to get this kind of funding, two or more offices had to be involved as the idea wasn’t good enough to just get the funds from one. There are no experts in the government, except at spending.
Example: One government office spent who knows how much to make a system to recover water from humvee exhaust. Millions later, two gallons of fuel would make one gallon of water… Yet those two gallons of fuel could move the thousands of pounds of the humvee, passengers and, instead of the weight of the system, an extra 20 gallons of water. Some solutions do not have a problem attached.