Redland Media and the Zhaga Consortium

For over three years, Redland Media has provided marketing communications services to the Zhaga Consortium, a global lighting-industry association that is standardizing LED components.

For more information on Redland Media, please contact Tim Whitaker. 

Auroralia Award highlights sustainable urban lighting projects

Two European cities – Ghent in Belgium and Valença in Portugal – received the top prizes in the 2012 Auroralia Award, which rewards the best sustainable urban lighting initiatives. Third place went to Los Angeles, while Buin in Chile received a special mention from the independent panel of judges.

The Auroralia Award is organized jointly by LUCI and lighting manufacturer Schréder. LUCI (Lighting Urban Community International) is an international urban lighting network of cities with over 100 members, including 65 cities on 5 continents.

Ghent, Belgium, won first prize in the 2012 Auroralia Awards

The 16 nominees for the 2012 award were varied in their subject and scope, and confirmed a “strong commitment from cities and towns for a rational use of natural resources,” said the organizers. The judging criteria took into account the efforts to minimize the project’s environmental impact – quantified in particular by a reduction in CO₂ emissions – but also looked at each project’s exemplary character, its integration within a larger plan, its socio-economic relevance, its educational dimension and its originality.

Full details of the 2012 Auroralia Award and the winning cities can be found at: http://www.auroralia.org/auroralia-award-2012-2. The prizes were awarded on December 7th at a ceremony during the Festival of Light in Lyon, France.

In brief, Ghent has implemented a city-wide lighting scheme that is focused primarily on energy savings, as part of broad “Rational use of energy” program. The city has conducted a targeted and gradual replacement of its lighting installations, in combination with strict financial management and high targets for reducing energy consumption and CO₂ emission.

The Valença project was on a smaller scale than Ghent’s, and focused on improving the nocturnal ambience of this medieval town as well as saving energy. Metal-halide lamps were used initially, and LED luminaires were used in the second stage of retrofits. Incidentally, Ghent has been able to achieve its savings targets without relying on LED technology.

LED lighting in Buin, Chile

This contrasts with Los Angeles, which is undertaking a massive LED street-light retrofit program. More than 100,000 LED fixtures have already been installed in the city.

Changing scale again, Buin has installed LED lighting in public spaces to improve feelings of safety and well-being, while also preserving biodiversity (and of course, saving energy). The judges were impressed with the city’s proactive approach, setting a great example to other less wealthy municipalities.

LightingEurope aims to represent Europe’s lighting industry

A new industry association, LightingEurope, was officially launched on December 5, and intends to act as the “strong and representative voice” of the lighting industry in Europe.

Essentially, this new group represents a re-constituted merger of two existing European associations: the European Lamp Companies Federation (ELC) and the Federation of National Manufacturers Associations for Luminaires and Electrotechnical Components for Luminaires in the European Union (CELMA).

Members of LightingEurope can either be national lighting associations (many of these are current members of CELMA), or they can be European lighting companies of any size that are active in consumer and/or professional lighting.

Current ELC members are lamp manufacturers (only 12 companies in total), but LightingEurope will be extended to accommodate companies make any relevant products, including light sources, luminaires and related electrical components.  

The stated aims of LightingEurope are:

- to represent at European level the interests of its Members in order to create an optimum market environment for its Members;

- to be an industry-driven association that can respond quickly and adequately to European and global industry opportunities and issues;

- to shape political agendas and policies, to establish industry positions and provide guidance to its Members;

- to promote lighting technology enabling high-quality, efficient lighting to promote well-being, health and safety of consumers and the global environment;

- to promote European and international legislation, regulations and standards to propose minimum performance and quality standards for lighting products.

Founding members of LightingEurope are:  

AFLE;  AGID;  AGORIA;  ANFALUM;  ASSIL;  ASSOLUCE;  Aura Light;  Belysningsbranschen;  BLV Licht-und Vakuumtechnik GmbH;  FEEI ;  GE Lighting;  GIL;  Havells Sylvania Europe Ltd.;  IGNES;  NLA;  NMB Minnebea GmbH;  OSRAM AG;  Panasonic Lighting Europe;  Philips Lighting;  Pol-lighting;  PZPO;  Syndicat de l’Eclairage;  The Lighting Industry Association ;  TOSHIBA Europe GmbH;  Venture Lighting Europe Ltd.;  ZUMTOBEL AG;  ZVEI.

OLED installation in BMW museum

An OLED installation entitled “Dandelion” will be on show in the BMW Museum in Munich, Germany, until the end of January 2013.

Dandelion installation in the BMW Museum

Manufactured by Osram, the installation consists of about 1,000 OLED panels. The light-emitting layer of the OLEDs is approximately 400 nm thick. When switched off, OLEDs can be reflective, neutrally white or transparent, depending on the material used for the underlying substrate.

Osram expects that OLED technology could be used in automotive applications in the next few years, for example in rear lights or decorative interior lighting.  

Visitors to the Osram stand at Light+Building earlier in 2012 may remember seeing a similar OLED installation.

Osram stand at Light+Building 2012

Philips highlights role of lighting to unlock potential of energy efficiency

Philips says that a full switch-over to energy-efficient LED lighting would provide significant energy savings, equivalent to cost savings of approximately EUR 130 billion, or to a reduction in the need for 640 medium-sized power plants.

The remarks were part of call by Philips for governments, businesses and society to accelerate the implementation of energy-efficient lighting in an effort to combat the effects of climate change.

LED lighting on the Meydan Bridge in Dubai

Speaking at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Doha, Qatar, Philips advocated energy-efficient lighting as a means of lowering costs, improving competitiveness, and significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

“LED lighting is a technology innovation that enhances efficiency and brings substantial savings,” said Eric Rondolat, CEO of Philips Lighting. “These savings can potentially be re-invested in cities and new infrastructures, thus enabling sustainable growth.’’

Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC, said that energy-efficiency measures hold enormous potential not just to make a significant contribution to curb global greenhouse gas emissions, but to cut energy bills for consumers and businesses, support green jobs and enterprises, and boost economies.

“In collaboration with key stakeholders including business and industry, governments need to step up measures that promote behavioral change and drive energy efficiency improvements across all sectors,” said Figueres.

A report from leading energy consultancy Ecofys titled: “The benefits of energy efficiency: why wait?” is being published at the global Climate Change Conference in Doha (COP18) in partnership with Philips. The report aims to estimate the scale of the benefits of energy efficiency, based on assessments from the most authoritative organizations in this field.

One theme of the report is that improving the efficiency of general electricity usage can result in significant reductions in the need for capital investments in public energy infrastructure.

Kandeh Yumkella, the UN Secretary-General's designated Special Representative for Sustainable Energy for All, added: “Strengthening energy efficiency provides a twin-win for both the climate and the economy. It is one of the most powerful, cost-effective tools available to help meet our climate goals while also saving money for governments, businesses and consumers alike.”

Osram to spin off from Siemens, with further job cuts

Subject to shareholder approval, Siemens will spin off its lighting subsidiary Osram next year as a separate company. After shelving plans for an initial public offering (IPO) of shares, due to unfavorable market conditions, Siemens will hand over 80.5% of the Osram business to existing Siemens shareholders.

By avoiding the IPO route, the deal becomes “more independent of capital market conditions,” said Siemens. As an independent company, Osram will have access to more flexible financing options.

However, Siemens wants to retain a level of control in its subsidiary; Siemens AG will hold 17% of shares in the devolved Osram, while the Siemens pension fund will hold 2.5%. If the deal is approved by a 75% majority at the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting on January 23, 2013, then Siemens’ shareholders will receive one Osram share for every ten Siemens shares.

The discussion to make Osram a separate company has been going on for a couple of years. Siemens announced in March 2011 that it would conduct an IPO in fall of that year. The IPO was delayed due to the state of market – both the lighting market and the overall global climate – and then subsequently cancelled.

Osram is the world’s second-largest lighting company, behind Philips, and has annual sales of around EUR 5 billion.

While getting ready to split from Siemens, Osram is already under a major restructuring program involving the loss of thousands of jobs. The aim is to save a total of EUR 1 billion by 2015.

The job losses, both in Germany and internationally, are mostly via the closure of manufacturing plants that make products that are reaching the end of their product lifecycles.

But elsewhere, Osram is investing in its capabilities to manufacture products using newer lighting technologies – or, in its own words, “building up capacities in future-oriented business areas.” This reflects the changes being seen throughout the lighting industry.

For example, Osram has inaugurated a new halogen production line at its Eichstättlocation, and construction of a second line is already underway.

The company also plans to invest “a low three-digit million euro figure” over the coming years in its LED assembly plant in the Chinese province of Jiangsu. This plant will manufacture products for key segments of the Chinese market and the entire Asia region. In five years’ time, Osram expects this region to account for around half of the global general-lighting market.

OLED luminaire from WILA wins Osram design competition

At the recent Lux Live tradeshow in London, Osram held an OLED luminaire design contest entitled “The Artist”. The competition gave designers a chance to use a range of OLED components from Osram to create their own masterpiece, with the winner receiving GBP1000. 

Judged by visitors to the stand, the winner was Christopher Vater of WILA, with the O-Ledic concept.

Vater (left) of WILA, and Osram's Cathcart

Ian Cathcart, National Sales Manager, OEM, Osram UK, said: “Congratulations to our worthy winner, Christopher Vater, a Product Designer at WILA, for harnessing the incredible possibilities of OLED with a design that impressed all the visitors to the Osram stand. Innovation is at the heart of what we do at Osram, which is why we were keen to run a competition to inspire the next generation of designers.” 

O-Ledic design from WILA

The modular O-Ledic design includes two types of panels, which can go either in the center or at the end of a strip. And as shown in the image below, the strips can be built into any number of shapes and designs.

Over the last few years, tradeshow visitors have seen many OLED luminaire designs, although these should be considered prototypes rather than true products. Companies such as Osram, which manufactures and supplies OLED panels, are waiting patiently for the market to develop.

Designers enjoy the new design freedoms offered by OLEDs, especially their ultra-thin format. As planar, surface-emitting light sources that don’t require reflectors or lenses, the OLED light sources essentially become the luminaire, so minimalism is the order of the day. And if the manufacturers such as Osram eventually succeed in offering flexible OLED components that can be curved into different shapes, this will offer yet another design dimension.

OLEDs might be the technology behind the thinnest planar light sources – in the same ways that OLED TVs offer ultrathin form factors – but LED panels offer an alternative. And currently, compared to OLEDs, the LED is mature, stable and reliable.

In fact, Osram was also showing at Lux Live a neat luminaire, the Silento, based on LED edge-lit panels that can be adjusted to direct the light as required. Available now, and considerably cheaper than an OLED prototype. 

Osram's Silento LED-based luminaire