Philips has announced to sell its LEDs which are recognized as the sole winner (so far) of the US Department of Energy’s “L Prize” competition for 60 W incandescent bulbs commercially from February.

According to the DOE, 60 W incandescents are important because they are the most common household bulb in the US, with nearly a billion of them thought to be in use. And while it has qualified more than 400 LED lamps under its Energy Star program so far, the vast majority of these are relatively low-brightness and directional.

At the DOE webinar, Philips Lighting’s Todd Manegold outlined that despite the high cost of the technology, in many common applications it would still offer a very short payback period. In those estimations, the price of the LED bulb is set at $50 – a hundred times that of a conventional incandescent bulb. But with the Philips replacement only consuming 10 W, energy consumption is cut by 83%.