Comparison between white light LED and other light sources

This article summarizes the performance comparison of white light LEDs with other light sources. White light LEDs are becoming more and more popular due to their advantages such as low power, high luminous efficacy, and good mechanical strength.

When we evaluate a light source, we generally need to look at several of its characteristics: power, luminous efficacy, light characteristics, and price.

Power is the commonly used input power of this light source. For example, a 100W incandescent lamp means that its input power is 100W. Each light source can cover a large power range. Here we only compare the commonly used power range.

Luminous efficiency is the ability of a light source to convert electrical energy or other inputs into light energy. We use luminous flux as the evaluation standard for light energy. The unit of this efficiency is (lumen/watt), which indicates the ability of a light source to convert each watt of energy into lumens.

Light characteristics refer to the color, luminous area, light divergence angle and other characteristics of the light source. Light characteristics often determine the application range of a light source. For example, lasers have good directionality and can be used for distance measurement, while fluorescent lamps have good divergence and are suitable for indoor lighting.

The prices vary greatly due to different power, so we roughly compare the price per 1000 lumens. At the same time, the difference in power consumption caused by different lighting effects will be briefly analyzed later in the article.

Here is a simple diagram to illustrate:

The common light sources in the table all have clear uses. As a product that is still evolving, white light LEDs need further development in their application beyond flashlights, headlamps, portable devices, and other occasions.

It can be clearly seen from this table that except for the slight advantages of LED in terms of light characteristics and other characteristics, it is completely at a disadvantage in terms of power and price.

Especially the price, which is the most fatal factor limiting the current application range of LED. The power limitation makes LED unable to be used for large-scale lighting, such as airports, construction sites, and even indoor lighting. LED cannot be compared with fluorescent lamps.

In actual applications, when the lighting equipment has high power, power consumption is also a cost that cannot be ignored. However, LEDs cannot take advantage of fluorescent lamps and HIDs with higher light efficiency.

Before there is a major breakthrough in power and price, the promotion of LED lighting is difficult. Although many cities have invested in the construction of some public LED lighting equipment, as it stands now, this behavior is nothing more than a waste of taxpayers' money.

In addition, the advantages of colored LEDs for decoration are relatively more obvious, because when ordinary light sources become colored light sources, their light efficiency will generally decrease, and LEDs have almost absolute advantages in the field of colored light efficiency. Unfortunately, as a traditional decorative lamp, neon lights have reached a very high cost-effective level, and it is not easy for LEDs to replace them.

The only strength of LED is the lighting of small and low-voltage devices, such as mobile phones, DC and other household digital products. These products are expensive, so the relatively expensive defect of LED becomes less obvious.