Canadian billboard gets pedal-powered, shows off LED efficiency

Considering our everyone's infatuation with everything LED is fairly evident, we couldn't help but stop and stare at a Canadian billboard sporting no fewer than 1,500 LED lights, all brightly shining to spread some holiday cheer. But the method to the madness is what's important here, as this particular poster had no direct contact with an AC outlet, and reverted to getting its juice from some 120 pedal-pushing volunteers instead. The DDB/Vancouver project was lit for five consecutive days on behalf of BC Hydro, and was setup to display just how efficient LED lighting really is. According to BC Hydro, the same amount of wheel-turning energy would've only lit up 120 incandescent bulbs, which would've left Rudolph a bit dimmer than expected. The only thing missing, however, was a government-employed robot to crank out a few more miles once the humans went home for the holidays.

[Via OhGizmo]

[Cowboy Bob @ Dec 20th 2006 3:40PM]

gotta love canada

[kballs @ Dec 20th 2006 3:40PM]

So what is the point of this? To get us to buy LED light bulbs or to get us to buy an exercise bike that feeds power into our house... oh that's right, YOU CAN'T GET EITHER ONE, at least not for a reasonable cost, not with choices of models, and not with choices where to buy it.

[Chris @ Dec 20th 2006 4:29PM]

Wearing a helmet on a stationary bike is EXTRA safe!

[Colin @ Dec 20th 2006 3:47PM]

Note that this is in British Colombia .... it is the cold version of California where all the hippies and their offspring have grown up.

Long live power hungry central Canadians.

[Danomite @ Dec 20th 2006 3:53PM]

This billboard was in the parking lot of my apartment building. During those five days we had two of the biggest snowstorms we've had in vancouver in years. You gotta respect the people peddling at 3 in the morning in a snowstorm.

[nimro @ Dec 20th 2006 3:55PM]

LEDs FTW!

[catachip @ Dec 20th 2006 4:02PM]

Note that it's British Columbia - (we're not a territory of South America's Colombia, unfortunately. Just a note, BC Hydro is a government "crown" corporation that runs the electricity, almost exclusively from Hydro electric power. Because they cannot run a profit, it's in their interest to get people to use less electricity. They do a good job.

[LukeA @ Dec 20th 2006 4:09PM]

I've got LED christmas lights. They're awesome. No heat, no breakage, they last 200,000 hrs, cool bluish light...

[Thomas Chung @ Dec 20th 2006 4:19PM]

Me too! We just got those lights a few weeks ago and I just hung them up last week. I can now sleep tight knowing that at the end of this month I won't get a tsunami in my electric bill.

[Colin @ Dec 20th 2006 4:45PM]

I spelled it Colombia on purpose...bunch of crack heads out there...

[catachip @ Dec 20th 2006 5:43PM]

We're pot heads in B.C., but not crack. Crack is for babies.

[MED @ Dec 20th 2006 8:01PM]

you know colin that you couldnt be more wrong it just the fact that B.C is using more energy than its making so they want people to use less energy so that the province can become self sufficient. i dont know where you got that picture of B.C but your way off.

[Dave @ Dec 20th 2006 5:08PM]

Purchased all new LED Christmas lights this year. The packaging shows the cost of the LEDS, vs standard mini lights and two types of the common large lights. The listed cost difference is crazy!

I will have to wait till I get my next bill to find out if it is all true, but it was enough to make me want to run my lights for many hours a night.

[Rick Lyon @ Dec 20th 2006 6:20PM]

LEDs rock. I have the christmas lights also. I have a desk light with 72 LEDs, equal to about a 60w bulb and it uses a whopping 2 watts of power. They make replacement LEDs for bulbs and recessed lights if you search the web. I can't wait for the tech to expand and prices to come down. Incandescents are going the way of the CRT.

[kballs @ Dec 20th 2006 6:56PM]

The LED light bulb replacements that are out there output about equivalent to a 25w or 40w incandescent, and cost $40 each! With recessed lighting and all, my house has about 70 bulbs, that would cost about $2500-3000 for lights! My electric bill is $30-40/month... maybe about $15 of that is for lighting... that would take about 15 years to break even! (who knows if I would even live here that long)

That's not exactly commercialized pricing, marketing, or availability... more like they are being built individually in somebody's basement.

[texyak @ Dec 20th 2006 7:21PM]

Okay, I'll say it. I, for one, welcome our eco-friendly mass advertising overlords.

[Diddle @ Dec 20th 2006 8:29PM]

Colin also thinks that BC is in central Canada. He needs a map too.

[educationvictim99 @ Dec 20th 2006 10:38PM]

americans+geography=mass brain explosions

[tekdroid @ Dec 21st 2006 12:25AM]

what is the motivation for the volunteers? I would hope they would be getting paid (and paid well) by BC Hydro.

[finalgasp @ Dec 21st 2006 7:37AM]

wat d'ya mean robots can pedal thru' holidays !!? how dare say such a dastardly deed

[Nelg @ Dec 21st 2006 3:09AM]

Yay, this is great. We need to make the common consumers used to led's, so that the transition from common lamps is more widespread and faster. Sadly, nowadays it's not economically useful to install led's to a household because they don't use AC voltage and they don't have enough power to lighten rooms efficiently, so they manage only as christmas lights. A sad purpose for such a great technology.

And a led is not a lamp or bulb, it's diode.

[Eric B @ Dec 21st 2006 7:25AM]

FYI -> Volunteer = Not Getting Paid.

The term volunteer means that you are giving your time away freely, BC Hydro will not be paying them for their time as they volunteered.

[Sam @ Dec 21st 2006 4:25PM]

@Diddle
I got the impression that Colin wasn't saying that BC was Central ... I assumed HE was from Central Canada.

Makes sense now doesn't it?

[Gord @ Dec 22nd 2006 4:25PM]

I was one of the volunteers who lit up the LED's for a few hours on one of the nights. For every hour it was lit up, BC Hydro was donating money to the Vancouver Foodbank. I think it wound up being something close to $20,000.

The amount of wattage required was surprisingly low. I'm a competitive road cyclist and have a Cycleops PowerTap on my bike. Easy spinning around 20mph/30kmh is typically in the sub 200W range. On the reindeer bike, we were barely pushing any resistance. I'm guessing it was closer to sub 100W - really minimal. A couple of guys thought you needed to really crank it and they blew the fuse on the unit!

Just goes to prove how energy efficient the LED's are. There were a lot of them and it was pretty effortless.

[Solar Richard in Tacoma @ Dec 22nd 2006 5:01PM]

I'm Solar Santa with 600 LEDs on my Santa Suit that is solar powered with a small solar panel, battery and inverter. I have a picture but don't know how to add it here. I'm new to this type of technology.
I do sell LEDs for all your needs. Everything!
I'm doing a bridge in Tacoma, Washington that will be the "Cats Meow" with color changing LEDs on the spans. www.NarrowsBridgeLights.org Enjoy!
P.S. Try www.SolarRichard.com to contact me.

[ECO-Technician @ Jan 27th 2007 8:44AM]

For those of us who live in darkness this sounds a good idea. Any one know howmany led lights would be need for patway lighiting, general movement lighiting or even facade and display lighiting. Can they be used for sign boards may be not vegas style but just to let passers by in an ocean of darkness know that theres habitation round the corner.

Help with the conversion of the machanical (no shortage of bikers) to electrical would also be welcome.