Royal Philips: All Cities and Utilities Worldwide Should Switch to LEDs

Royal Philips used Climate Week NYC to announce its partnership with The Climate Group and support its call for all cities and utilities worldwide to switch to LEDs by 2025. Philips said that it is supporting The Climate Group’s global campaign entitled “LED = Lower Emissions Delivered.”

 In a statement, Philips pointed out that replacing conventional streetlights with LEDs cuts energy use by 40 percent to 50 percent. An additional 30 percent reduction is realized with such things as sensors and software control systems.

Illuminating Ideas On LEDs In Healthcare

LED technology’s reputation as an energy-saving light source and a good replacement option for incandescent and halogen lamps has led to broader use within healthcare spaces. However, the lighting source isn’t always understood by the people who specify it, use it, or maintain it, says Karen Murphy, senior professional associate at HDR Inc. (Omaha, Neb.). “There are misconceptions that LEDs last forever or that you never have to maintain them,” she says, and someone who operates the technology that way may end up problems, including diminished light levels or inappropriate color metrics.

Chinese packaged LED manufacturer MLS buys stake in Kaistar Lighting

Forest Lighting has issued an announcement stating that its China-based parent company MLS has acquired an 11% stake in Kaistar Lighting. Presumably, the investment will help MLS continue to expand its presence in the packaged LED space through an intricate set of partnerships that are tied to China Electronics Company (CEC) — a holding company with businesses across the high-tech space and with relationships to a number of LED and solid-state lighting (SSL) companies.

It’s getting increasingly more difficult to track the intertwined business and technology affiliations of LEDs and SSL in China, and the investment by MLS in Kaistar further complicates the situation. Generally, CEC has been the active investor in companies, but in this case MLS has essentially become partners with some of CEC’s affiliates.

Automotive Headlights to Be Lit Up by LED Lighting

Traditional halogen front headlight bulbs will continue to dominate OE fitment globally, according to the latest data published by just-auto's QUBE automotive analysts.

With a fitment rate of over 80% in 2015, accounting for some 73 million front headlight sets, the analysts assert that halogen is still the leading automotive front light technology solution for the global industry.

However, just-auto's analysts believe that, although fitment will decline to about 75% by 2030, volume will increase by nearly 35% to some 99 million headlight sets due to continued total industry volume (TIV) growth.

This performance of halogen, while losing market share, will translate to a CAGR for the 2015-2030 period of a narrow 2%, slightly below the TIV CAGR of 2.6% for the same period.

According to just-auto's research, the growth star for headlamp technology will be LED. The sector will grow at a CAGR of 16.2%, leading the technology to pass BiXenon in the market by 2025.

The key drivers that just-auto's analysts cite for the increasing use of LEDs in front lighting, largely at the expense of Xenon, is their falling cost relative to Xenon and improving performance and reliability. Globally, it is anticipated that LED penetration will increase from some 2.5% in 2015 to nearly 17% in 2030.

Soraa’s LED Lighting Makes the Atmosphere in London’s Yauatcha City Restaurant Simply Perfect

Soraa announced that its LED lamps have been installed at the new Yauatcha City restaurant in London’s Broadgate Circle. Officially open the summer of 2015, Yauatcha City is a unique, contemporary dim sum teahouse that is lit to create both a sense of drama and intimacy for the restaurant patrons.

Paul Nulty Lighting Design (PNLD) chose Soraa LED lamps because of their unique quality to deliver perfect rendering of colours and whiteness. Soraa LEDs create a dramatic lighting environment that is consistent with Yauatcha City’s identity and characteristics. The restaurant’s architectural details include bespoke bone white china pendants that use Soraa lights to illuminate each seat individually. Soraa downlight LEDs create the drama in the restaurant’s starlit ceiling and illuminate the beautiful, blue glass balustrade.

Cree Introduces High Intensity Color LEDs for Highest Candela Performance

Cree, Inc. CREE, -1.92% introduces XLamp XQ-E High Intensity LEDs, the industry’s first family of color LEDs optimized for optical performance. This drop-in upgrade for proven XQ-E High Density designs enables lighting manufacturers to double the candela performance with minimal redesign. The new High Intensity LEDs leverage XQ-E’s proven optical symmetry and consistency across all colors to improve color mixing and simplify the production process for lighting manufacturers. Built on Cree’s breakthrough SC5 Technology™ Platform, the XQ-E High Intensity LED is the smallest building block available for color LED designs allowing lighting manufacturers to quickly boost performance and drastically reduce size for directional applications such as track and architectural lighting.

Available in white, red, red-orange, PC amber, green, blue and royal blue, the XQ-E High Intensity LED features Cree’s innovative new primary optic design that radically reduces optical source size by more than 50 percent to deliver the industry’s best optical control.

The XQ-E High Intensity White is available in color temperatures ranging from 2700K to 6200K and CRI options of 70, 80 and 90. Product samples are available now and production quantities are available with standard lead times.

LiFi? How your LED desk lamp could help you connect to the Internet

Lighting has come a long way since Tom Edison lit his first incandescent bulb in the 1880s. LED bulbs are popping up everywhere, on planes, car headlights, in your phone. When you buy a new light bulb now, chances are it's going to be an LED. At the heart of every LED is not a little wire. If you open up an LED, there's a semiconductor in there, and engineers are exploring more ways to use that semiconductor — everything from wireless data streaming to secure communication systems and in-flight networking.

LEDs illuminate Jerry World and the Nashville Predators NHL Arena

Musco Lighting has announced that it supplied LED-based lighting to AT&T Stadium, often referred to as Jerry World in honor of flamboyant owner Jerry Jones, and home of the Dallas Cowboys of the National Football League (NFL). Ephesus Lighting has announced another sports-lighting project with SSL being installed at the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, TN — home of the Nashville Predators of the National Hockey League (NHL).

The Cowboys stadium becomes the second NFL venue to be lit with LEDs. As we covered early this year, the Super Bowl was played in February at the University of Phoenix stadium in Glendale, AZ, which had SSL installed before the start of the 2014 NFL season. In both cases, the LED-based sports lighting improves visibility for players and spectators, and improves the quality of HDTV broadcasts for fans watching from home.

Seoul Semiconductor announces CSP LEDs for general lighting

Seoul Semiconductor has announced that it is beginning mass production of LEDs in a chip-scale package (CSP) that the company calls WICOP (wafer-level integrated chip on PCB) LEDs. The new LEDs designed specifically for general illumination are being called WICOP2, differentiating the solid-state lighting (SSL) sources from earlier WICOP LEDs that have been sold in backlighting, automotive, and camera-flash applications.

Merck and Tridonic Enter Into White LEDs License Agreement

Merck announced that it has entered into a license agreement with Tridonic Jennersdorf  (Tridonic) covering silicate phosphors for use in white light LEDs. Along with Toyoda Gosei (Japan), Leuchtstoffwerk Breitungen (Germany), and Litec (Germany), Tridonic holds basic patents relating to a technology to generate white light using blue LEDs and novel yellow silicate phosphors. This combination of silicate phosphors applied to blue LED chips enable manufacturing of packaged white LEDs with high accuracy and high brightness. Primary applications include backlights for cell phones, laptops, GPS and other small displays, which account for a high share of today’s global LED market.

Researchers developed highly accurate method for measuring luminous efficacy of LEDs

Researchers at Aalto University and VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland have succeeded in developing a method which helps to improve the relative uncertainty in measuring the luminous efficacy of LEDs from the approximate five percent of today to one per cent in the future. The results were just published in the distinguished Light: Science & Applications journal. Thus far, solutions based on incandescent lamps have been used in photometry, i.e. in measuring light detected by the human eye, explains Tomi Pulli, a doctoral student at Aalto University.

The photometers that lamp manufacturers use for calibrating their devices have been produced and calibrated for incandescent lamps, which results in errors when measuring the efficacy of LEDs. In our research, we used a LED lamp with a well-defined spectrum and a PQED detector, which we developed together with VTT MIKES Metrology and European partners, and whose spectral responsivity can be determined highly accurately. Therefore, there was no need for the problematic optical filters used in applications based on incandescent lamps. Indeed, accurately determining and analysing the spectrum of the LED was the most challenging and crucial part of the research, he reveals.

The detector used in measurements by Pulli and his co-researchers measures the illuminance of LEDs in a very small area. According to Professor Erkki Ikonen, the head of research, the next step will be to move onto measurements corresponding to real-life conditions for lighting.
 

Larson Electronics Releases an 800 Watt LED Trailer Hitch Mounted Work Light

Larson Electronics has announced the release of an 800 watt LED trailer hitch mounted flood lighting system equipped with 100’ of SOOW cable terminated in an industrial grade cord cap.

The WAL-THT-2X400LTL-LED-100 trailer hitch mounted flood lighting system by Larson Electronics is a telescoping light tower that allows operators to elevate 800 watts of LED lighting. It comes complete with two IP67 rated 400 watt LED light heads that produce 52,000 lumens each for a combined total of 104,000 lumens. This receiver hitch mounted light tower is comprised of two adjustable LED light heads mounted atop a telescoping tower fabricated from light weight powder coated aluminum. This adjustable and collapsible tower can be extended to 10’, collapsed to 6’, and includes two stabilization legs.

Lumileds addresses colour mixing with equal-focus LEDs

Lumileds has tackled colour fringing in LED lighting with a range of LEDs that with matched optical centres regardless of wavelength. The family of devices is called Luxeon C Colors, and is aimed at stage and television lighting, as well as architectural lighting. “We’ve solved the problems of beam halos and mismatched, un-mixed colour by designing our platform to offer multiple colours with a single focal length,” said Lumileds product manager David Cosenza. When secondary optics are applied, the consistent focal length provides matched emission patterns, smoothing mixing.
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Heliospectra sales up as US cannabis farms adopt LEDs

Heliospectra, a small Swedish company specializing in LED systems for growing plants indoors, says that its sales have doubled over the past year – with demand booming as US growers of cannabis become the latest customers to adopt the technology. The Gothenburg-headquartered firm has just reported financial results for the first half of 2015. Revenues of just under SEK 5.4 million ($0.64 million) were up 113 per cent on the same period last year.

IES publishes TM-30 defining new color metrics for characterizing lighting

The Illuminating Engineering Society (IES) has published a new Technical Memorandum — TM-30-15 entitled "IES Method for Evaluating Light Source Color Rendition" — that promises to supplant CRI as a color metric. TM-30 relies on separate fidelity and gamut metrics, as well as a set of color samples that is more representative of real-world objects as opposed to the pastel samples that were primarily used for the baseline CRI metric that was sometimes called Ra. The new color metric is intended to fairly and accurately characterize both LED-based solid-state lighting (SSL) and legacy sources.

Startup uses LEDs to grow plants in shipping containers

After 40 years growing plants — running nurseries in Thailand and managing landscape projects in Vietnam — Glenn Behrman was ready to retire. Then the New York native discovered sunless vertical farming, which means growing plants indoors and nourishing them with LED lights. With no plan, no design and no business yet, he moved back to the U.S. and went to work building a controlled environment inside a shipping container.

Escatec cools high-brightness LEDs

ESCATEC has a solution to the challenge of effectively cooling high brightness LEDs. Its Heat Spreader approach solders the LEDs onto a copper substrate, which is up to ten times more effective at dissipating the heat generated by the LEDs than current solutions. The CoolRunning design means that LEDs with a power density of up to 10W per mm2 could be passively cooled.

LED bulbs distribution a success

In an innovative attempt to help consumers save energy, BSES in collaboration with EESL (Energy Efficiency Services Limited) is facilitating distribution of highly subsidised LED bulbs in south, west, east and central parts of Delhi. Over the span of three months since the launch of this scheme, 16 lakh LED bulbs have been sold in areas where BSES is operational; 10 lakh LED bulbs were distributed in BRPL area and six lakh in BYPL area, as per BSES data.

Product Test: Acandescence light bulb

I have a desk light that requires a 40-watt or less bulb. I wanted more light but didn’t want to risk a fire hazard, so I suffered through the meek lighting. But this bulb by the Finally Light Bulb Co. uses only 14.5 watts and gives off 60-watt quality light. Warning: Do not use this bulb in a fixture with a dimmable switch. That would be bad news, very bad.

A Lamp That Brings the Cosmos Indoors

This lamp is called Helios and seems to conjure celestial bodies in motion. The sun is a naked bulb, burning bright or barely glowing, depending on how you deploy the dimmer or position the 12-inch hand-spun brass dish that serves as a planetary lampshade — angled in front, it creates a full eclipse. Designed by Robert Highsmith, a co-founder of the Brooklyn-based Workstead studio, known for a spare, industrial aesthetic warmed by luxurious materials (they did the interiors of the Wythe Hotel in Williamsburg), the lamp’s luminous components hover above a 4-inch cube base, available in three types of stone: pale Italian Carrara, deeply veined green Connemara and creamy gray travertine.

Lamp puts unique spin on pendant lighting

To add to the Pinterest board, Amazon wish list, wedding registry or other "to buy" list: a Spokes hanging lamp from Foscarini. Inspired by antique Asian lanterns, birdcages and bicycle wheels, this contemporary-looking lighting fixture was designed by Vicente Garcia Jimenez and Cinzia Cumini — the creative duo behind Studio Garcia Cumini Associati — and is one of our favorite recent finds.

Solar powered lights will replace the 'outdated' reflective studs

Cats eyes are set to be replaced on Britain's roads by new solar powered LED lights. Long-standing traffic legislation is set to be rewritten to pave the way for the new 'active studs', which can shine for up to 10 days with just four hours of charge. The LEDs can be seen from as far away as 1,000 yards, which is ten times further than the traditional reflective studs, and are seen as a much better alternative for drivers motoring in bad weather.

LED Displays Get Wearable

As the craving for wearable electronics grows, laboratories around the world have been seeking to integrate fabric--the raw material of fashion—and electronic displays. Various researchers have demonstrated fabrics that change color, but Imec (formerly the Inter-university Micro Electronics Centre, Leuven, Belgium) today claims it is the first to integrated light-emitting-diodes (LEDs) into a flexible, wearable fabric that serves as both a sensor and a display.

Light bulbs 101: What you need to know about CFLs and LEDs

Buying light bulbs has gotten complicated and expensive over the past couple of years.  Fall means shorter days. And that means light bulb sales are up. Brownsboro Hardware & Paint owner Jim Lehrer explains new regulations for light bulbs and how knowing the difference in bulbs can save you money. He says federal regulations have changed what he can sell today versus just a few years ago.

This New 3D Printed Stepper Motor Uses LEDs to Show Exactly How It Works

You may recall a recent story we did about a man named Anthony Garofalo, who had 3D printed his own working stepper motor. Certainly not the first 3D printed motor we had seen, it was very unique in its own right, and Garofalo had made the design files available for anyone to print out themselves. In fact, he created an entire Instructables tutorial to teach others how to do so, under the Proto G user name.

Clever technical breakthrough could make LEDs as inexpensive as incandescents

It was only a few years ago that I was testing LED bulbs that cost $100 each. How fast things change. Today, many high-quality ones are under $10, and some good ones are even starting to be sold under $5 (sometimes with rebates). But if this breakthrough from the Florida State University (FSU) pans out, we could soon see much cheaper LED lights thanks to a new, simpler way to manufacture the light emitting diodes that are at the heart of the new energy-efficient bulbs.

Osram engineers LED-based sensor for fitness tracking

Osram Opto Semiconductors has expanded its portfolio for the optical measurement of pulse rates and blood oxygen levels. The new SFH 7060 LED-based sensor from Osram Opto Semiconductors is designed to measure pulse rates and the oxygen saturation level of blood. It offers excellent signal quality and low energy consumption. The main market segment for this component includes mobile devices such as smart watches and fitness armbands – also known as wearables – for continuously monitoring fitness levels. This integrated optical sensor contains five light emitting diodes with three different wavelengths and one high-sensitivity photodiode.

India To Replace 20 Million Streetlights With LEDs In 2 Years

The Ministry of Power in India has reiterated its commitment to replace conventional bulbs with LEDs in streetlights and in the domestic sector. The Indian government announced the Domestic Efficient Lighting Programme (DELP) earlier this year, and according to the government, about 20 million bulbs will be replaced by LEDs at an estimated cost of Rs 2,500 crore ($385 million). The Minister of Power Piyush Goyal reiterated his government’s commitment at a recent meeting of the renewable energy agencies of Indian states.

Professor uses 3D printed vegemite to power LEDs

The list of 3D printable materials has gotten very long and diverse over recent years, and only seems to be increasing in length at a very steady rate. But among it are some very surprising (and sometimes even edible) materials, and one Dutch professor at the University of Wollongong in Australia has just added perhaps the strangest: Vegemite. Despite all the inventive Vegemite recipes out there, no one has ever tried to 3D print it, which is exactly what professor Marc in het Panhuis has now achieved. You might know this engineering expert for a number of other 3D printing innovations. Just recently, we reported on his involvement in a 4D printed valve.

Thermofilm introduces new Bliss LED furniture and decorative lighting

Thermofilm Australia announces the release of the new Bliss lifestyle indoor and outdoor LED furniture and decorative lighting products.

Designed for high versatility in application, the Bliss range is portable in design and can be easily recharged via an induction dock or plug-in adapter. Made from durable UV stabilised PE plastic and electrically rated for outdoor use, the Bliss range can be used anywhere around the home. Some models feature IP68 rating for water resistance.

Bliss LED furniture and decorative lighting products can be combined with a feature packed remote for full control over the lighting experience. The remote can be used to change the colour (up to 15 different colours), and control brightness and sequence including slow fade or strobe effects.

The Bliss range is recommended for illuminated furniture or as a feature for the outdoor entertaining area, in the garden or around the pool; and can also be used to create mood lighting for living rooms and kids’ bedrooms.

LEDs set to get cheaper, efficient

One of the biggest hurdles in adoption of LED lighting is the cost involved and the inability of energy savings to offset these high costs. This is about to change as a new research has shown promise of a efficient yet cheaper LED technology. The new LED technology, which is said to have the potential of revolutionising lighting technology, has been developed by Zhibin Yu, Assistant Professor of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering at Florida State University.

New light bulbs offer alternative to LEDs and CFLs

For consumers who are still bemoaning the phaseout of incandescent light bulbs, hate the harsh CFLs and can't figure out LEDs, another option may be on the horizon -- a new kind of bulb is slated to hit store shelves this fall. Like LEDs and CFLs, the new bulbs, developed by a startup company called Finally Light Bulb, are much more efficient than the old power-sucking incandescent ones and are reputed to last far longer. But unlike much of the competition, they look almost identical to the old bulbs and promise to emit light of the same color.

ROAL's MESO 50 LED drivers feature multi-unit RFID wireless programming

ROAL Electronics SpA announces the release of its newest programmable LED drivers, MESO 50, with the RFID wireless programming feature. This new RFID technology offers measurable benefits by enabling simultaneous feature-set programming of multiple devices without the need to turn on the unit, or remove the product from its packaging.

MESO 50 LED drivers provide 50 watts of power in a very compact size (105 x 73 x 27 mm / 4.13 x 2.87 x 1.06 in), with worldwide AC input voltage range (120/230/277 VAC) and the industry’s first multi-unit wireless programmability feature. These combined features reduce design time, lead time, and part numbers to stock while increasing designer flexibility. MESO 50 is also available with optional DC power input.

MESO 50 LED drivers' unique multiple dimming options include Analog  0–10V, digital control via either DALI or PWM, and push dimming. MESO 50 ensures universal adaptability and delivers many advanced features such as lower THD <20%, PF >0.9 at any nominal input voltage and 5kV surge protection. It is also suitable for harsh environments up to 90°C case temperature.
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Designed in Italy and made in Tunisia, MESO 50 carries a 5 year warranty.

Hitoplux develops 130-lm/W UFO LED luminaire for industrial lighting projects

Hitoplex has released a new UFO shaped LED luminaire model, with good heat dissipation & high lighting efficacy. It is designed to replace conventional LED high bay lights and metal halide, HPS & mercury vapor lights. Applicaties are in the area of workshop, warehouse, toll station, supermarket, exhibition hall, gymnasium and other indoor and outdoor high ceiling applications.

• Patented heat dissipation system guarantees stable performance of the LED luminaires
• Equivalent to 600~700W HID
• Light efficacy 110~130 lm/W
• Top brand Philips SMD LED with LM-80 certification
• Mean Well power supply, exposed to the air directly with specially designed heat sink fins, spreading the heat to the air very quickly, thus enhancing the lifetime of the lamp
• Hitoplux's PCB is four to six times larger than competitors, which leads to higher efficiency of heat dissipation and a longer lifespan of the individual LEDs
• Aluminum alloy housing and electrostatic sprayed surface reaches good resistance to corrosion, complying with UL & CUL standard
• IP65 waterproof

Noribachi Zippy Kits are available for simplified LED luminaire retrofit upgrades

Noribachi, a leading U.S.-based custom LED manufacturer for high output commercial and industrial lighting solutions, is proud to announce the launch of Zippy Kits!, an easy, energy-efficient and virtually maintenance-free retrofit kit for LED luminaire upgrades.

"Unlike other retrofit kits on the market today, all Zippy Kits! comply with UL1598 out of the box,” said Franklin Dibachi, Director of Engineering, Noribachi. “By removing the need for a custom retrofit mounting plate, Zippy Kits! can be shipped within 72 hours and installed immediately with the available hardware and step-by-step installation instructions.”

All Zippy Kits! retrofit kits are DLC listed for outdoor luminaires and qualify for rebate incentives. At launch, Zippy Kits! will be available in round, square and cob configurations and serve as 100W to1500W HID, MH or HPS bulb replacements ranging from 2,331 to 23,090 lumens. They can easily retrofit Arealights, Bollards, Canopy, Cans, Cobraheads, Downlights, Floodlights, Post Tops and Wallpacks lighting fixtures.

This Ingenious $20 Lamp Gets All Its Energy From Gravity

The ingenious GravityLight—a light that gets all its energy from its own weight—first appeared about three years ago. We wrote about it as it was launching on Indiegogo and went on to raise $399,590. It provides free light (after you've bought it). It's cheap. And it has none of the environmental or health side-effects as do other light alternatives in the developing world. But even all those things aren't necessarily enough if it's to reach its potential. If the company and foundation behind the device are to make it a success, they need a reliable product; they need to distribute it in places where distribution can be difficult; and, more fundamentally, they need to explain why someone should buy a GravityLight when there's plenty of good, cheap solar on the market today.

215 Million And Rising: Surge In LED Installs Is A Growing Threat To Utility Industry

The cumulative number of light emitting diodes (LEDs) installed across the United States has soared during the past two years—topping 215 million at the end of 2014 according to DOE’s latest data. That’s good for the environment (the amount of source energy needed to power the more efficient LEDs is about 143 trillion British thermal units less than the previous status quo) and consumers (savings topped an estimated $1.4 billion annually in 2014)—but not for growth-starved electric utilities. And, this is just the beginning of a transition that poses serious problems for utilities already grappling with long-term slow-growth forecasts.

Finally light bulbs cost a pretty penny, but cast a nice glow

Now that the feds have phased out old-school incandescent bulbs, manufacturers have gone to town offering next-generation replacements that use electric power more efficiently. That’s a laudable goal. But the result is that a trip to the hardware store’s lighting aisle has become an exercise in comparing technical specs just short of shopping for a new cellphone. Then there’s the light itself, which can be perfectly pleasant, eerily blue, or astonishingly white, depending on the bulb’s makeup.

Toshiba Expands Line-up of High Power White LEDs for LED Lighting

Toshiba Corporation’s Semiconductor & Storage Products Company announced the addition of 4 new products to its line-up of the “TL1L4 series” of high power white LEDs, that achieve high luminous flux of 140lm(min.). Shipment of the new products starts from today.

The new “TL1L4 series (4A5B type)” achieve a high luminous flux of 140lm(min.) [1] compared to the 130lm(min.) of conventional general products of the “TL1L4 series”. The 4 new products are in correlated color temperatures (CCT) of 6500K/5700K/5000K/4000K with a color rendering index of Ra70. The new products make it possible to achieve market requirements of lighting fixture efficacy over 110lm/W[2], and can contribute to improving luminous efficacy and lower power consumption of LED lighting applications.

SIL Europe co-locates with LuxLive in London for 2015

The sixth annual Strategies in Light (SIL) Europe conference, which has been held in Munich for the past three years, will take place at the ExCeL London Exhibition and Convention Center on Nov. 17–19, 2015. In November 2014, PennWell Corporation, the sponsor of SIL Europe, acquired Revo Media Partners, the publisher of Lux Magazine and the organizer of the LuxLive trade show. Realizing the strong opportunity for synergy between the two events, PennWell made the decision to co-locate them in 2015. Over the past several years, LuxLive has come to be recognized as one of the premier lighting tradeshows in Europe, attracting over 7,000 visitors in 2014.

This is the perfect snapshot of how new bulbs in streetlights are ruining your view of the night sky

If you go outside at night and look up at the sky, the chances are that if you're living near a city, you're not going to see much. That's because cities and towns have been steadily increasing their use of specific types of artificial lights to illuminate evening activities. By transitioning to light-emitting diode (LED) light bulbs — cities save a ton of energy, but as we are now learning, are also making light pollution worse.