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Nanotech Could Make Incandescent Light Bulbs As Efficient As LEDs (sciencemag.org)

sciencehabit writes: Thomas Edison would be pleased. Researchers have come up with a way to dramatically improve the efficiency of his signature invention, the incandescent light bulb. The approach uses nanoengineered mirrors to recycle much of the heat produced by the filament and convert it into additional visible light. The new-age incandescents are still far from a commercial product, but their efficiency is already nearly as good as commercial LED bulbs, while still maintaining a warm old-fashioned glow.

11 of 338 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Not a "warm glow" by Junta · · Score: 5, Informative

    They mean warm in the sense of color temperature (yellowish).

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  2. Re:Too bad science class drop outs banned incandes by Microlith · · Score: 4, Informative

    They did legislate efficiencies.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    B. Lighting Energy Efficiency

            Requires roughly 25 percent greater efficiency for light bulbs, phased in from 2012 through 2014. This effectively bans the manufacturing and importing of most current incandescent light bulbs, though by 2013 at least one company had introduced a redesigned incandescent bulb for which it claimed 50 percent greater efficiency than conventional incandescents.[18]
            Various specialty bulbs, including appliance bulbs, "rough service" bulbs, colored lights, plant lights, and 3-way bulbs, are exempt from these requirements as well as light bulbs currently less than 40 watts or more than 150 watts. This exempts stage lighting and landscape lighting.
            Requires roughly 200 percent greater efficiency for light bulbs, or similar energy savings, by 2020.

    So if they can make an incandescent that meets those requirements, who cares. Now go make another grievously uninformed post.

  3. Re:Great! by Firethorn · · Score: 5, Informative

    Filament bulbs can last 5+ years, if you engineer them to, especially at the "warmer feeling" lower temperatures.

    They can make them last centuries. The current longest lasting filament bulb is at 114 years and over 1M hours.

    The 'trick' is that the heavier and cooler the filament it, the longer it lasts - but the less efficient it is at making light.

    So a .25 cent bulb that is engineered to last about 3-6 months in normal usage is at a sweet spot - you could make it last longer, but it'd use more than .25 cents worth of extra electricity in that time. So it's cheaper to make it a bit more energy efficient at the cost of life span.

    Of course, equations change as the price of electricity goes up.

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    I don't read AC A human right
  4. Oven lights are still allowed... by Firethorn · · Score: 3, Informative

    In every case I know, you can still get the incandescents - they just can't be 'general use' bulbs. 40W appliance bulbs are still available for environments like your oven. Short of halogen bulbs(which are actually a variation on incandescent), no other lighting technology can withstand the heat well enough.

    Otherwise, you'd have to get fancy with a light pipe or something in order to keep the light generator cool enough, and even then you might have problems during things like self-clean cycles. In the end, it's just not worth it, the light isn't on that much, and most of the time you're heating the inside with electricity anyways, so it's not like bulb efficiency really matters.

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    I don't read AC A human right
  5. Re:Great, but LEDs improve dramatically every quar by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    LED bulb nerds should checkout bigclivedotcom's channel on YouTube. Where he does teardowns of LED light bulbs purchased on eBay and from his local "pound shop" and other assorted cheap Chinese crap.

    Here he does a teardown on what sounds like your "chip-on-glass" LED bulb. He approves of it.

  6. "The Subdivision of the Electric Light" by westlake · · Score: 3, Informative

    He didn't invent the light bulb, and he didn't invent that, either.

    He and his team invented a long-lived, high-impedance, incandescent lamp that could be wired in parallel --

    as well as developing a complete and commercially viable system for safely electrifying your home our shop. Including the training of a new generation of electricians.

  7. Re:but do they last as long? by LinuxIsGarbage · · Score: 3, Informative

    Name names! Some companies make complete junk products, others don't.

    Lights of America make complete and utter junk.

    Cree (in addition to being huge in the actual LED elements) makes bulbs in a very nice form factor, and they do put off a very nice color (for emulating incandescent) and I think a comparable amount of light. Unfortunately they seem to be the golden child of tech reviews that circle jerk about how great they are. Downsides? I see higher than average failures from real-world reports, yes they have a 10 year warranty, but you have to pay shipping, and they buzz like a mofo on a dimmer.

    Phillips. I still have a Phillips CFL from 15 years ago (with three arch tubes) that hasn't died yet. Well I doubt their new product line has the same longevity, I'm reasonably satisfied with them as a brand. The Philips "SlimStyle" seems to be a good low end LED light. It looks strange but has decent light distribution, OK color, fewer failures than Cree from field reports, and a good price. Downside is they buzz in dimmers too (though not as bad as the Cree), but seem silent in normal lamps.

  8. Re:Great! by Firethorn · · Score: 5, Informative

    I'm old enough to remember taking our burnt out bulbs down to the local Edison to exchange for free new ones.

    Electric company, I take it? Consider what I said, the electric company could have been 'rent seeking' in a completely different way than Phillips. Sure, they're perfectly happy handing you 75W bulbs that last darn near forever, but produce the same amount of light as the Phillips 60W that doesn't last as long.

    That extra 15W could garner them an extra $13/year if the light's on all the time. Not bad for a giveaway of an under 25 cent bulb, bought in bulk. Cost differences for varying light output and longevity amount to a rounding error given how small the tungsten element is and that 'power' depends on the shape. Thicker element = longer lasting higher power bulb. Shorter element = shorter lasting higher power bulb. Thinner/longer = lower power. Balance to fit.

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    I don't read AC A human right
  9. Re: Great! by tlambert · · Score: 3, Informative

    The only thing that was weird was getting used to the new spectrum. It took about a week or two, and I haven't looked back.

    Mostly because it's impossible to see in the blue, blue light from those CFL bulbs, and if you can't see anyway, there's no reason to look back?

    While there are a couple of nice colored LED candelabra bulbs that are livable, if slightly expensive I have never enjoyed reading or painting (or even charcoal drawing) under CFL bulbs; they're just obnoxious.

    And given that I've read slightly over 17,000 books so far, it's one of the pastimes that I like to be able to enjoy without eyestrain. Impossible with CFLs.

  10. This is not a solution for LED by GPS+Pilot · · Score: 4, Informative

    If this was such a good solution, it could probably be used for LED lights as well

    No. Incandescent filaments have to be hot to produce light, but with its entirely different mechanism, reflecting infrared back onto a light-emitting diode will not help it produce more light. Heat is NOT good for the diode. LED bulb designs actively do the opposite of these nanomirrors: they transfer heat away from the diode. (You may have noticed the fins on some LED bulbs. Their purpose is to radiate heat and keep the diode cooler.)

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  11. Re:Great! by Firethorn · · Score: 5, Informative

    You make it sound like the absurdly short life of incandescent light bulbs neatly correlates to its efficiency.

    Well, I wouldn't go that far. It's a value that can be tweaked, it's not infinitely adjustable in range between a 100% efficient bulb that's a camera flash to a 0% efficient bulb(well, 0% would be doable).

    And yes, I was kind of not properly rating the effect of the vacuum or noble fill of a bulb.

    As for driving to a store to get replacements? Who, back in the day, didn't keep bulbs on hand and just pick up bulbs as part of a larger shopping trip? Heck, even with LEDs I only recently put my last LED in and need to restock. Worst case I grab a bulb from somewhere less used.

    When its cold enough, the entropy from my desk lamp simply causes the electric heater to take a little longer before turning on.

    Or, if you're in a cold enough climate to not have direct resistance heating, you're back to still wanting electric efficient bulbs because the heater, whether heat pump or fossil fuel, is a lot cheaper than electric heat.

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    I don't read AC A human right