Axiom NZ White LEDs used to Showcase French Leadership in Using Alternative Energy Solutions

Artist Gilles Conan illuminates Espace EDF-Bazacle in Toulousse France

Along the Garonne River in Toulousse France the world can take the past, the future, and the present and put them all together in a single art installation.

The Espace EDF-Bazacle building is located on the banks of the Garonne river, in the heart of Toulouse. The Espace EDF Bazacle is a hydroelectric plant that is still operating. Built on the site of a former mill which originated in the eleventh century, Bazacle opened some of its spaces in September 2002 to host exhibitions. In 1371, the mill Bazacle's purpose was to create a company with shares distributed between partners - similar to public companies we know today. The charter, approved by the King of France, is one of the earliest documents attesting to this practice. In 1888, the company Toulouse Electricity transformed the mill into a hydroelectric plant to provide energy for lighting the street lights in the center of Toulouse. Today, the plant produces electricity through machines installed in 1919 and 1933 and, since 1989, the doors have been open to the public who can come and see how the hydroelectric plant works as well as admire the fish ladder that allows salmon to ascend the Garonne river.

Today the facility is owned by Electricité de France, the European leader in nuclear energy. France was recently rated as having the #1 Quality of Life in the world to live in by a USA magazine International Living - >>See Article.

Electrical power in France is generated 70% by nuclear power versus only 18% in the USA where the predominant power generation is done by fossil fuels like coal (48%) or natural gas (22%). Studies have shown that the mercury generated by coal power plants, mercury levels in fish, mercury perservatives used in medical vaccines, and by disposal of fluorescent lighting in the trash can result in human physical and mental problems like Autism and Alzheimer's  (>>See Article by UC Davis The Mind Institute)

This French art installation coupled together with energy efficient lighting from New Zealand is powered off of running water.

"We find that this creative installation by Gilles Conan complements our thinking about environmentally friendly energy generation," commented Manuel Lynch, Founder of Axiom NZ LED. "We manufacture our products in New Zealand where the main form of power generation is hydro-electric conversion."

The art installation takes the form of a spinning wheel made out of light, commonly seen on the internet or on an iPhone as you wait for data to be downloaded.

The art installation moves from the virtual world of computing to the real world as the installation will take place during a period of rebuilding work inside the building.

The luminous round signs are illuminated by the worlds most energy efficient Axiom NZ White LEDs mounted on the wall of the ancient mill.

The art dynamically changes the way it spins and the way it lights and using the the passing hydroelectric conversion of passing water of the Garonne river will use 5 times less power to illuminate the area then is normally used.

The successive revolutions of the circles will alternate at different paces and intensities. From time to time, those arbitrary trances loaded randomly will be disturbed by other random subprograms that will create ‘crackles’ that are soon metabolized by the main rotational motion. The LED lighting is fed by renewable means (River Garonne), and at times will create "energetic overcompensation" by extinguishing the permanently installed illumination on the bridge pillars and incorporates different institutional and non-institutional replacement lighting into the art installation in a showcase to show that "less is more". Using technical and historical pragmatic reversals, the work of art will be less luminous but more visible in the same time. The Rollin’ art installation will only use 1 kw per hour while saving 5 kw per hour.

The Axiom NZ White LED Modules used in the art installation are the highest efficiency or lumen per watt (lpw) production LEDs available on the market.  The LEDs are from Nichia of Japan and feature performance ratings of 120 Lumens Per Watt, almost 5x higher then conventional incandescent light and nearly 10x the efficency of neon, and 50% higher than fluorescent lighting.

Gilles Conan has shown the world that we can take a building which is an iconic example of how public companies are structured today that was established in 1371 by the King of France and can merge it with simple energy production techniques like hydro-electric power and can combine that with the highest efficiency LED light source and use it to showcase what is to come.

"Less is more" and Gilles Conan shows us that maybe we should take a step back and remember our past to "roll" foward and be conscious of the environment.