ENERGY SAVINGS

Modern technology has made a big difference in energy savings. One of those savings is in the modern technology of light bulbs. The incandescent bulbs seems like it has been with us forever. However, they are becoming a dying breed. The light bulb in my opinion is one of the greatest inventions of mankind.

Most people give Thomas Edison credit for inventing the light bulb. That is not so, the first light bulb was invented by Sir Humphry Day in 1802. Others tried perfecting the light bulb through the years however they all failed in getting it to work properly for a long period of time. Thomas Edison developed the first commercially practical incandescent light bulb. He had many failures in what led up to that achievement.

It is a time now when incandescent light bulbs can be replaced by light bulbs that use much less energy. CFL bulbs (compact fluorescent light bulbs) were the first advancement. They take much less energy to use. In the most recent of times there is now the LED (light emitting diode) bulbs.

CFL bulbs will use 75% less power than incandescent bulbs. An LED bulb will use half the energy of a CFL bulb. Incandescent bulbs are by far the cheapest to buy but consider the life span of an incandescent bulb. The average life span of an incandescent bulb is about 1,500 hours of use. A CFL bulb has around 10,000 hours of use and an LED bulb has a life span of up to 50,000 hours.

George W. Bush signed the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. It calls for a 30% reduction in the power needed to operate light bulbs. For example it called for a 100 watt bulb to use 72 watts by 1/1/2012, a 75 watt bulb to use 53 watts by 1/1/2013, a 60 watt bulb to use 43 watts by 1/1/2014, and a 40 watt bulb to use 29 watts by 1/1/2014.

Lighting is a major use of power in the average home. Changing to CFL or LED lighting will make a reduction in your energy bills. Yesterday I bought my first LED bulb. Yes, it cost much more than the incandescent bulb it was replacing. However, I have replaced that one 60 watt bulb 4 times in the past year. My new LED bulb will use 11 watts instead of 60 and it is rated to last 35,000 hours. The light emitted is great and I am well pleased. I will be changing 6 other bulbs to LED bulbs in the coming months.


Copyright  Larry W. Fish  2014