The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has published the 2014 edition of the Solid-State Lighting (SSL) R&D Multi-Year Program Plan (MYPP). This year's edition provides a description of the activities DOE plans to undertake over the next several years to implement its SSL mission, and informs the development of annual SSL R&D funding opportunities.

Widely referenced by industry and government both here and abroad, the MYPP reviews SSL technology status and trends for both LEDs and OLEDs and offers an overview of the current DOE SSL R&D project portfolio. While the entire MYPP was updated with the latest figures, some revisions were more extensive. For example, the Technology Status section for LEDs was reworked based on an efficacy target of 250 lm/W, with a deeper analysis of the three different architectures (phosphor-converted, color-mixed, and hybrid), and a section on SSL sustainability was added. For OLEDs, we included a more detailed analysis of efficacy for the different panel structures.

The R&D priorities identified in the MYPP were selected based on discussions during the 2014 SSL R&D Workshop in Tampa, FL; more-detailed discussions within a selected focus group; written input; and internal DOE discussions. DOE will continue to update the MYPP on an annual basis, with input from industry and academic partners as well as from workshop attendees, to incorporate new analysis, progress, and research priorities as science evolves.

Below are some key developments highlighted by the report:

• Adoption of SSL products continues to increase. For 2013, the installed base of LEDs in the U.S. has increased in all LED applications, more than doubling from 2012 to about 105 million units.
• Correspondingly, the annual energy cost savings from LEDs more than doubled in 2013 from the previous year, increasing to $1.8 billion. That is enough money to pay the annual lighting electricity bill for over 14 million U.S. homes.
• Cree and Philips have both announced the development of luminaire prototypes that have achieved efficacies of 200 lm/W, demonstrating the feasibility of reaching these performance levels.
• LG Chem has commercialized organic light-emitting diode (OLED) panels with efficacy levels of 60 lm/W and a color rendering index of 90.
• Konica Minolta has developed a prototype OLED panel with an efficacy of 131 lm/W and lumen maintenance, L50, of 55,000 hours at 1,000 candelas per square meter for a device with an area of 15 square centimeters. They have also developed a flexible OLED panel with a thickness of only 70 micrometers.
• LED A-lamp pricing continues to decline, with non-dimmable 60W A19 replacement lamps now available for as little as US$ 10 per bulb and dimmable lamps for as little as US$ 13 per bulb. The price drops even further in regions with utility rebates.
• The City of Los Angeles has completed a four-year, citywide street lighting replacement program and has installed over 140,000 LED streetlights. The total installed base of U.S. outdoor area and roadway LEDs exceeds 3.3 million. 

Download a PDF of the updated MYPP