Below is a picture of Mario chatting with a man at a store where we were buying switches and wire.

Stores keep inventories low because in Nicaragua people don’t buy as much as they do in the US – or any other country I have seen for that matter. Since we are here attempting to find some of the parts we need to build solar lamps, this has been really frustrating. It’s not like you can go to Fleet Farm and buy 20 roles of tape if you need them – you have to go to 10 different stores and buy 2 rolls of tape at each store. We ran into this problem with AAA battery holders this past Friday…it turns out there are only about three of them in the whole country and they need to be shipped in from Costa Rica which takes a week or two. I suppose it’s possible there are more and we will find out one way or another whether there are or whether we have to make them!

Despite tradgety and hardship, I am happy to be here with my good freind and long time cohort on the project, Mario Aleman. We have been working for two years to be able to work on the accomplishments we hope to achieve in the coming weeks. I am happy to feel sunlight on my face and to see dust clouds disapear with out a trace, to put it in the words of U2. If you have ever heard the song, “Where the Streets Have No Name,” which according to Time Magazine is often linked to Managua since the streets quite literally do not have names, you might remember the line, “I want to reach out and touch the flame…” I think I know what that came from – driving through the city late last night, there they were – the familiar sight of small garbage fires on the side of the street in every other neighborhood. The first time I saw those years ago they surprised and somewhat disturbed me – now they look so familiar that they comfort me in a way.

I wanted to take this opportunity to post a picture of Mario in his office here in Managua – as a young entrepreneur he runs his small imports service business from here. To me it symbolizes the begining of our journey because we have been able to use this small space today to budget and schedule for the next month. I am writing this post for the moment now as he had to go to a job interview for an engineering position. Later today we will be purchasing the remainder of our supplies. Be well and until next post…

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Some of these scientists don’t believe global warming exists, some of them believe that the mainstream predictions on global warming are inaccurate.  Some – interestingly don’t dispute mainstream claims – but believe that global warming will be a benefit to society. 

Whether global warming is an out of control phenomenon or not, Bright New Ideas is dedicated to the idea that sufficiently cleaner air is a human right.  A lot of people have asked us why don’t we talk about global warming more in our efforts to reduce air pollution and improve health?  Well the answer is because that’s not our focus.  Our focus is to improve health and access to education for people around the world.  Our vehicle for doing that is solar energy and LED lighting.  Reducing air pollution, especially practices such as use of kerosene indoors, may happen to be congruent with the effects of climate change and it may not.  But at the very least it means a cleaner and healthier world for many people who deserve it.

“Resonet,” a public art project based in the United Kingdom used LEDs in a highly creative way. The Resonet lights up based upon resonant frequencies in its surrounding environment. This is an interesting example of how LEDs – used in our solar lamp project – can be used in many more creative and imaginative ways. You can visit the Resonet website here.

An expert in the article alludes to the idea that stock prices of solar energy firms would be affected by solar tax credits.  The expert [Horowitz] says that tax credits “would not be a deal breaker” for stock prices because the largest market for solar is currently “offshore.”  So supposedly a jump in US demand for solar power would not create a huge change in solar energy firms stock prices.

As a director of a solar energy project affecting users in the developing world it’s interesting to me to consider not only how this will effect stock market prices of solar energy companies, as was referred to by Horowitz, but also how it will affect the price of solar panels themselves.  Will this solar tax credit in the US cause a huge worldwide demand in solar panels the likes of which we have never seen?  A large enough jump in demand may possibly create a jump in prices – which, if the tax credits are not extended for years to come – may create a successive lowering in price.  No one knows what may happen – but you can take a look at how solar energy prices have fluctuated in the past here.

For those readers in Minnesota who may be thinking to themselves, “California – must have been too far away,” you’re wrong – as can be evidenced by this Press Release from January 31st, 2008.My opinion foremost is that we should be thankful that this potentially dangerous meat was uncovered – as I do remember hearing horror stories in the past about cover-ups in the meat world. It’s no stretch of the imagination to think that nations and businesses may behave unethically to protect their short-term bottom line – but in this instance it seems there has been enough public outcry to warrant action.I should note that the President of Westland-Hallmark did post a reply on February 3rd to what appears to be previous complaints or recalls on their website. If that explanation has been taken down you can view it here.

The key “new idea” to this story which has never been seen before is the online video. It was the online video that promoted public outcry and action. So my new idea to improve public health and by extension education is that web-cams be posted along the entrance to harvest facilities so that the public can see for themselves in real time that all livestock entering is indeed ambulatory as the Westland Hallmark President assures all of his customers. Perhaps this should be a special requirement for meat processing plants supplying school lunch programs.

The answer – according to experts at this week’s Strategies in Light conference in Silicon Valley – is that LEDs are still an emerging technology.  During a conference segment on “Overcoming Solid-State Lighting Challenges Today,” experts spoke of some of the many challenges LEDs still face – inconsistency in their manufacture, brightness output and wide-ranging, largely obtuse claims being made about their performance which may be true for some LEDs – but not for others.

According to experts attending the Strategies in Light Conference, LEDs with inconsistent quality are often widely found among those manufactured in mainland China.  For example, out of over 200 LEDs tested from 20 different vendors in China by a Humbolt University Project – over 80% did not meet brightness metrics claimed by the manufacturer and over 20% were only fulfilling about 10% of the brightness requirements.  Moreover, the widely made claim that you will get 50,000 hours out of an LED was at one point described as “NASA-quality” by a representative from a well-known silicon manufacturing company.

So what will we see from LEDs in 2008?  More performance, better output, more efficiency – but on top of that, managed expectations.  Over the past 5 years, LEDs have been widely publicized – but these publications have been often built on generating excitement and seldom detailed enough.  For example, what does 50,000 hours even mean?  In some LEDs that may be a hypothetical number that perhaps 10% of a batch may be able to achieve.  We will see better standardizations and better protections put in place so that your 2008 LED Christmas lights will hopefully come out looking pure clear white – not half white/green and half white/blue as with what happened to my family this past year!

Overall don’t lose faith in LEDs and if you go with LEDs be willing to pay for quality – it’s quality that gives the longer lifetime and higher efficiency.  Products which promise the same for less should be subject to your skepticism.