The voluntary LED Lighting Facts program was created in 2009 to help manufacturers, utilities, and others in the early days of LED lighting, when products entered the market with little or no verified information on product performance. At that time, DOE technical support had assisted in the development of industry standard test procedures such as IES-LM-79-08 and IES-LM-80-08, which enabled product performance to be reported in a fair and comparable way. DOE testing and analysis of purchased LED products (conducted by independent, qualified test labs) highlighted product quality issues and helped discourage low-quality products and inflated manufacturer claims.

The LED Lighting Facts program created a framework to foster “truth in advertising” and to compel manufacturers to use the IES testing standards. The DOE LED Lighting Facts effort paved the way for the mandatory Federal Trade Commission (FTC) label required for most general service lamps (including incandescent, compact fluorescent, and LED light bulbs). Several workshops were held to help the FTC formulate their label, which was introduced in 2010. Subsequently, the DOE Lighting Facts program assisted in compelling manufacturers to apply the IES standards to all product types, and also by providing a publicly available database of checked data for comparison.

Altogether, DOE’s coordinated efforts had a significant impact on the early evolution and adoption of LED lighting technology and products. Over time, the LED Lighting Facts database grew to include more than 70,000 products and to serve more than 2,800 partners (manufacturers, retailers and distributors, lighting professionals, and energy-efficiency program sponsors). The LED Lighting Facts program officially ended in March 2018.

Existing consumer Lighting Facts labels required by Federal Trade Commission (FTC) rules were not affected by the closure of the DOE program. Those rules require the FTC labels to appear on packages for general service lamps and specialty consumer lamps. More information is available at Frequently Asked Questions for the FTC Lighting Facts label.