In response to SSL Manufacturing R&D funding opportunity announcement (FOA) DE-FOA-0000792, the US Department of Energy (DOE) has announced the competitive selection of five projects for solid-state lighting (SSL), involving a total of $10.1m in DOE funding plus $10.1m in matching private-sector investment from five firms.
The two-year projects will focus on achieving significant cost reductions while maintaining quality by improving manufacturing equipment, processes, or monitoring techniques.
This is Round 4 of the DOE’s investments in solid-state lighting manufacturing projects. The efforts are part of the DOE’s initiative to accelerate the adoption of SSL technology through improvements that reduce costs while maintaining product quality and performance. They are intended to play a key role in encouraging US-based manufacturing of SSL technologies — creating jobs, boosting exports, and promoting the USA’s role as a global leader in energy efficiency.
The five projects selected include the two projects below (final details are subject to negotiations):
Recipient: Philips Lumileds Lighting Company of San Jose, CA, USA. ‘Development and Industrialization of InGaN/GaN LEDs on Patterned Sapphire Substrates for Low Cost Emitter Architecture’ aims to reduce LED manufacturing costs by establishing a patterned sapphire substrate (PSS) fabrication process with demonstrated epitaxial growth of indium gallium nitride (InGaN) layers capable of producing high-efficiency LEDs when combined with chip-on-board packaging techniques. The proposed cost reductions would result from the elimination of some of the complex processes associated with current flip-chip technology, and from the enabling of lower-cost packaging methods that take advantage of the stability of the sapphire substrate, which is removed in a standard flip-chip device. This approach has the potential to reduce the cost of high-brightness LED lamps and modules targeted across a wide range of lighting and illumination applications, it is reckoned. Recipient: Cree Inc of Durham, NC, USA. ‘Scalable Light Module for Low-Cost, High Efficiency LED Luminaires’ aims to develop a versatile, low-cost, low-profile LED light-module architecture that facilitates the assembly of a variety of high-efficacy, broad-area LED luminaires. The light module will be driven by a novel, compact LED package for a combination of high color rendering index (CRI) and high efficacy over a wide range of color temperatures. To do this, Cree will take a vertically integrated approach to the development of the LED component and light module, optical, electrical and mechanical sub-systems for optimal light generation, distribution, extraction, and diffusion.
The remaining three projects include the following recipients: Eaton Corp of Menomonee Falls, WI, USA for ‘Print-Based Manufacturing of Integrated, Low Cost, High Performance SSL Luminaires’; OLEDWorks LLC of Rochester, NY, USA for ‘Innovative High-Performance Deposition Technology for Low-cost Manufacturing of OLED Lighting’; and PPG Industries Inc of Pittsburgh, PA, USA for ‘ Manufacturing Process for OLED Integrated Substrate’.
