URL: http://www.abqjournal.com/AED/292151477450biz06-29-09.htm
Monday, June 29, 2009
Visible Light Solar Technologies plans to change 'the way we light the world'
By Copyright © 2009 Albuquerque Journal By Michael Hartranft
Journal Staff Writer
An Albuquerque business has unveiled an array of the brightest new products integrating LED lighting and solar power technology.
Visible Light Solar Technologies has become the first commercial and industrial lighting company to create a retrofit hybrid solar device for interior and exterior fixtures, according to CEO/president Dee Dennis, 62.
"We're going to make a difference in the way we light the world," Dennis said about the company's launch. "For 150 years, it was all about pushing as many lumens onto the ground as possible without a thought to how much heat was generated or power was used. That is over."
By making the switch from traditional high intensity lighting to solid-state LED fixtures, local governments, businesses and consumers could save up to 189 terawatt hours of energy, the equivalent of taking 16 million households off the power grid, the company said.
Eye-popping potential
The breadth of the potential market, to be sure, is an eye-popper: Visible Light Solar estimates there are more than 100 million outdated street lights and parking lot and commercial and industrial fixtures alone that are candidates for its energy-saving, low maintenance products.
And, Dennis said, they would pay for themselves in a fraction of the time it takes with traditional lighting.
As a local example, the company cited a recent order for 110 solar/LED parking lot retrofits. The customer's high-intensity lights use about 218,000 kilowatt hours of electricity a year at a cost of $21,881. The company projects after replacing them with 72-watt LEDs, the customer will use 26,664 kilowatt hours a year at a cost of $2,666. The customer's estimated return on investment: 36 months.
"We anticipate our product is going to be very aggressive on the market," Dennis said.
Visible Light Solar occupies 8,000 square feet in the Osuna Business Park, spending 18 months in research and development for its inaugural Vector line of products in the lead-up to its June 17 launch date. It has 16 employees in Albuquerque plus a sales and marketing person in California, and is looking for bigger quarters, about 40,000 square feet, in the Interstate 25 corridor.
"We anticipate by the end of 2009 having a total work force of 40 individuals," said Dennis, who 30 years founded DKD Electric, an electric contracting company his son now runs. For four years, Dennis ran the western region for the Industrial Electric Services Co., which had 27 electrical subsidiary companies with 2,800 employees.
Hybrid retrofitting
LEDs — light emitting diodes — are a tiny light source that have been around for years and are commonly used in devices ranging from digital clocks to video game systems. They consume far less energy and last far longer than traditional lighting and the latest generation can achieve very high brightness levels.
"LEDs are just a natural fit; the power reductions are tremendous," Dennis said.
While Visible Light Solar builds on-grid LED retrofits without solar, it's the latter component that separates the company from others, Dennis said.
"Our hybrid is the strength of what we do. And getting the maximum renewable energy use out of every fixture," he said. "That's how we would love to sell every product we have."
The solar/LED hybrid is built to draw power first from a solar-charged battery, and then from the regular electric grid. The fixtures link the LEDs with the solar components through a SPDI — a patent-pending Self-Powered Device Interface that combines custom hardware and software to control voltage fluctuations, switching between the solar battery and regular grid power, and illumination levels.
The company's showroom, for instance, features a hybrid simulated gas lamp, similar to one the company installed in Old Town. It replicates the orange glow of a gas lamp, and has a programmable microprocessor that gives the light a flicker. The solar cells on top of the fixture are hidden by black mica, a material the company has done considerable research on as solar covering.
"Mica comes in lots of colors and we know this is going to lead to some other products in the future," Dennis said.
Dimming LEDs
Another fixture in the showroom features an LED walkway fixture with a motion detector. It is programmed for up to 18 watts, but is set to operate at a 9-watt level. When motion is detected, the light level increases for a specified time before returning to the lower level.
"Dimming LEDs is a technology nobody has developed, yet we have it," Dennis said.
So far, the company has installed or is in the process of installing retrofits for its landlord at the Osuna Business Park, DKD Electric, and nine or so other locations, including Bosque School on Albuquerque's West Side.
Bosque expects to save $11,000 a year in maintenance and electricity costs by converting the heads of 30 parking lot lights to LEDs with solar collectors on them.
"So you don't need to run any electricity to them, which is pretty innovative," said Bosque facilities director Kirk Ward. "You've seen landscape lights for several years and to get to commercial level ... is pretty exciting for us."
The school is also retrofitting pathway lights with LEDS, which for now, will run off the grid. The long-term plan is to tie them and all other exterior building lighting to a central solar system on campus, he said.
Visible Light Solar is funded in part by venture accelerator, Noribachi, based in Albuquerque.
"We have limited venture capital in our business," Dennis said. "Most of it is private investment and Noribachi input."