The Lamp of the Eskimo (1898)

January 8, 2023 by kris de decker Filed Under: History, Lighting, Random

Quoted from: Hough, Walter. The lamp of the Eskimo. US Government Printing Office, 1898.

Though the Eskimo live at a temperature of zero Fahrenheit, travelers have noticed their idiosyncrasy with regard to cold. The clothing is designedly left open at intervals around the waist and the bare skin exposed to the cold air. As a rule the Eskimo strip when in the house and sleep naked. Another indication of their feverishness is the consumption of great (quantities of ice-cold water. No explorer has failed to notice the Eskimo lamp, around which the whole domestic life of this people seems to focus. Far more remarkable than being the unique possessors of the lamp in the Western Hemisphere, the Eskimo presents the spectacle of a people depending for their very existence upon this household belonging. Indeed, it is a startling conclusion that the lamp has determined the occupancy of an otherwise uninhabitable region by the Eskimo, or, in other words, the distribution of a race. [Read more…]

The forgotten era of Light Reflectors in London’s alleys

June 29, 2021 by kris de decker Filed Under: Lighting

A visitor to Victorian London who found themselves in its many narrow alleys would have seen large numbers of wooden shutters reflecting sunlight into the offices. These weren’t just wooden shutters though, but Chappuis’ Patent Daylight Reflectors, invented by a French photographer based on Fleet Street in 1850, and there was a whole range of them to improve lighting inside buildings before widespread electric lighting.

Read more: The forgotten era of Light Reflectors in London’s alleys, Ian Visits.

Generating Light from Darkness

April 13, 2020 by kris de decker Filed Under: Lighting, Random

Night-time power generation analogous to photovoltaics would be an enabling capability for applications such as lighting and wireless sensors. We demonstrate a low-cost power generation device based on thermoelectric generators where the cold side radiates heat to the cold of space by facing the night sky. The power generated is sufficient to maintain a LED at night, enabling battery-free off-grid lighting. [Read more…]

Lighthouse Lamps Through Time

May 3, 2018 by kris de decker Filed Under: History, Lighting

“The ingenuity of man is truly amazing and this can easily be seen in the odd collection of techniques used for the illumination of lighthouses across the centuries. Lighthouse illumination began with simple wood fires and progressed through generations of other methods.”

“Even the oil lamp began in simplicity and evolved into a machine with multiple wicks, clockwork oil pumps, specialized chimneys, hydraulic, pneumatic, and other variants. This story will take you through the history of illumination methods in lighthouses.”

Read more: Lighthouse lamps through time, Thomas Tag.

Smart lamps can use more energy than incandescent lights

September 9, 2016 by kris de decker Filed Under: LEDs, Lighting

smart-lamp

“Combining wireless communication, intelligent controls and light emitting diodes (LEDs), smart lamps offer end-users features like colour tuning, dimming, changing lighting scenes, remote control, motion sensing control, daylight control and other features. But these features require energy even when the lamps are not providing light, but are instead waiting for a wireless instruction from a smartphone or remote control unit. Tests conducted on a limited number of smart wireless LED lamps reveal that these products can have substantial standby power use – which, depending on hours of use, can even be higher than the energy consumed when the light is switched on.”

“Domestic light sources… typically operate 1-2 hours per day. The smart lamps producing 200 to 1000 lumens of light tested in this project had an average standby energy consumption representing 51 % of the total daily energy consumption when these lamps are operated one hour per day. That corresponds to an overall efficacy of 9 to 51 lumens per watt, meaning some smart lamps had the equivalent performance of incandescent lamps [16 lumens per watt]. If the lamps are switched on for two hours per day, standby energy represented 35 % and the efficacy is approximately 16 to 64 lumens per watt, much lower than the non-smart LED lamps already on the market today.”

Read more: “Solid State Lighting Annex: Task 7: Smart Lighting — New Features Impacting Energy Consumption” (PDF). Summary. Picture: Lucid. Thanks to Noel Cass.

The Full Moon Theatre

March 26, 2013 by kris de decker Filed Under: Art, Lighting, Random

moonlight theatre

Under good climatic conditions and using specific technology, the full moon can be a powerful source of light.

Using technology inspired by solar energy concentrators, the “Full Moon Theatre” lights its performances using only moonlight. Moonbeams are collected, concentrated, and focused on stage.

The original Full Moon Theatre was built in Southern France and their plan is to create twelve Full Moon Theatres worldwide.

[Read more…]