DOE’s Caliper Report 15 compares flood lights

The US Department of Energy (DOE) has announced it has completed Series 15 testing of a group of 10 LED flood lights. The summary of the results has indicated there are several key areas in which LED flood lights should be improved to make them more competitive with conventional flood lights. These include higher lumen output, narrower spot distributions and a wider range of accessories to allow customization. The summary report is available at the DOE SSL website.

Lumen output vs. efficacy The 10 LED flood lights tested represent a broad range of conventional luminaires designated as flood lights. As a result, performance varied greatly among the products. The LED flood lights performed well in terms of efficacy but they did not match the lumen output of high-wattage metal-halide lamps. CRI of the LED flood lights was in the range of typical metal-halide and CFL lamps, but the correlated color temperature (CCT) of several products exceeded that of conventional products (>5000K). In terms of luminous intensity distribution, the majority of the LED flood lights had wide distributions. Producing narrow spotlights with LED fixtures has proven difficult according to the report.

Traditional LED luminaire advantages such as longer lifetime, better quality of light and high efficacy could outweigh some disadvantages depending on the application for the LED flood light.

DOE application reports

Beginning in 2012, each Caliper summary report focuses on a single product type or application. Caliper Report 14 involved the testing of 11 6-in round LED downlights, which performed well in comparison with 60W to 100W incandescent downlights and 13W to 32W CFL downlights.

Prior to that, Report 13 included the test results from a variety of products including LED and benchmark high-bay luminaires, LED wallpack luminaires and LED and benchmark 2x2-ft troffers.

The DOE has selected particular products for testing with the intent of capturing the current state of the market, a cross section ranging from expected low- to high-performing products, with the group designed to reflect the average of the range.

Detailed test results for each flood light included in the Series 15 report will be available soon through the searchable online Caliper system.