Budget required: $6+ per CFL lightbulb and $25+ per LED lightbulb depending on brand
Time required: couple of minutes
Estimated Impact: Varies, depends on you local utilities rate. For example a CFL lightbulb might save you about $15-$30 during its lifespan.

Tip: Most of the energy used by a regular incandescent lightbulb (about 90%-95%) is wasted by producing heat, not light. That means that a 60 watt lamp uses most of it’s energy to produce heat. Switching out an incandescent lightbulb for a Compact Fluorescent Lightbulb (CFL) or even a LED lightbulb might save you a lot of energy costs. Changing one lightbulb (also consider places like the lightbulb in your garage) can make a huge difference over time.

Also most people think these energy-savings bulbs give off a really ugly bright blue light when in fact this is not true for all brands. Just look at the packaging of the bulb and make sure it says “soft light”. The CFL lightbulb brand we use in our house that we’re really happy with is Bright Effects available at Lowes.

For comparison charts and more info checkout these resources:

• http://www.productdose.com/article.php?article_id=1142
• http://www.terrapass.com/blog/posts/deck-the-halls
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compact_fluorescent_lamp
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LED_lamp

From wikipedia:
Image: Lightbulb Comparison

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 18th, 2007 at 12:15 pm and is filed under Simple Steps, Large Impact. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.