What type of light bulb does your facility favor? If it’s LED, the future is bright.
General Electric announced on Feb. 1 that it will cease manufacturing compact fluorescent light bulbs in favor of light emitting diodes (LEDs) which are growing in popularity, according to Bloomberg news.
LEDs currently account for 15 percent of U.S. lightbulb sales, and are expected to account for half of all sales by 2020, according to the report. Prices for LED lights have declined, while the ability to integrate them into smart systems has added to their appeal.
Just days after the announcement that they were getting out of the CFL business, GE had a much bigger announcement to make. Current, a GE subsidiary, inked a deal with JPMorgan Chase & Co. to install LED lighting across most of Chase’s U.S. branches, making it the world’s largest single-order LED installation to date. The deal may include as much as 25 million square feet across roughly 5,000 branches.
The impetus driving the move to LEDs is the Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) signed into law in 2007. The second phase of the Act mandates an increase the efficiency of LEDs and other types of lighting devices. Developers and managers of multi-unit dwelling units, and universities are likely to be most impacted by the regulations, according to a recent post in Energy Manager Today.