Technologies and Devices International, Inc. (TDI), part of the Oxford Instruments Group, today announced it has been awarded $600,000 by the Maryland Energy Administration to help industry expedite the broad adoption of energy-efficient LED lighting, and better position Maryland to become a national solid-state lighting materials and equipment manufacturing leader.

This Clean Energy Economic Development Initiative award will enable TDI to hire three new scientists and engineers in 2010 and put it on track to create dozens more direct and indirect Maryland high-tech jobs by 2015. The award will help complete materials and process development and begin transferring that production technology to drive down manufacturing costs associated with LED lighting.

"This award will not only benefit TDI and Maryland, but also better position the United States to compete in the global solid-state lighting market,” said TDI President Bernard Scanlan. “Governor O’Malley and his team are working to create jobs by putting Maryland on the road to benefit from emerging technologies that will create jobs, cut taxpayers’ electricity bills, and reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil."

TDI’s proprietary Hydride Vapor Phase Epitaxy (HVPE) technology has allowed it to develop CrystalFlexTM, a prototype high-volume, industrial-scale manufacturing machine for free-standing Gallium Nitride (GaN) materials. TDI collaborators include the University of Maryland and other U.S. researchers and manufacturers.

The U.S. Department of Energy has identified the development of free-standing GaN substrates and their manufacture by HVPE as key technologies to enable reduced LED manufacturing costs with improved LED performance. Upon project completion, TDI’s high-volume manufacturing equipment will permit increased U.S. production of free-standing GaN substrates to meet growing global demand.

Federal studies have shown that 22 percent of all electricity consumed in the U.S. is for lighting. DOE projects that replacing incandescent light bulbs and fluorescent tubes with highly efficient LEDs would save taxpayers more than $17 billion in annual U.S. energy costs and result in a 33 percent reduction in U.S. electricity consumption relative to a scenario with no SSL on the market. The broad adoption of LEDs also would result in the need for 29 million fewer barrels of oil annually for electricity generation and reduce CO2 gas emissions by 155 million tons.

Oxford Instruments aims to pursue responsible development and deeper understanding of the world through science and technology, and this award will contribute enormously to this endeavor.