China demands less than 30K LED street lights; government changes direction

TAIPEI, TAIWAN: According to the statistics of industry research institute LEDinside, China’s overall demand for LED street lights in 2009 is less than that of the number the market had expected at the begin of 2009.

The main reason is that the street light standards has not been revealed yet, and quality and quantity of LED street lights still needs time to be tested and verified. As a result, the aspect to which the government’s policy supports is starting to change from outdoor lighting to indoor lighting.

Since LED lights have advantages in energy saving and environmental protection and because the government is vigorously promoting the green economy, LEDinside Research Director Roger Chu is expecting that China market demand for LED lights to reach more than 400,000 and estimating that it will be widespread after 2012.

Roger Chu indicated the total demand is nearly 164,000 LED lamps, according to LEDinside’s statistics on 30 cities in China that releases demand for LED lamps. In the recent information, demand from China for LED lights is under 200,000 lamps.

However, there are other cities in China that also have demands LED lamps, as well as few enterprises exporting LED lamps, LED lamps demand is estimated to approximately 200,000 to 300,000 lamps.

Of the 21 cities in the policy "10 City 10000 Lamps” only Weifang, Chongqing, and Baoding specifically addresses to install over 10,000 LED lights. Other cities have not made any clear demands for the quantity of LED lights; even if they do, it will be less than 10,000 LED lights.

In these 21 cities, most of them are only meant to establish pilot demonstration areas, which the overall quantities are minute.

According to LEDinside’s estimation, these 21 cities demand for around 130,000 LED lights in 2009, but the actual installation may actually be below 130,000 lamps. China's demand for LED lights in 2009 is underestimated, comparing with the market’s calculation of 800,000-1,200,000 LED lights.

Roger Chu also said that some metropolises, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and so on, are relatively discreet about promoting LED lights. On the one hand, LED lights must undergo actual tests before large-scale promotion, and the feasible industrial standards must set up.

On the other hand, the government hopes to pass the street light demonstration projects and to promote local development of LED industry. Therefore, they are not in a haste of replacing the LED street lights and expects to adopt LED lights to a wider scale after 2012.