Your briefing on LED home lighting
Things to know about LED lighting for your home, and how it can be beneficial.
Your electric bill is an inevitable expense. It’s a pain, but you need electricity and you have to pay it. Nonetheless, there is one home modification you can make today that could dramatically lower your electric bill, saving you hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars in the long-run.
You likely grew up in a home lit by incandescent light bulbs. These bulbs are not your friends when it comes to the monthly electric bill. So, we want you to make yourself familiar with the economics of LED light bulbs. Compared to an incandescent bulb, an LED bulb uses around half of the energy and lasts far longer.
Some metrics to know:
If you are making the transition from incandescent bulbs, we urge you to be conscious when deciding on which bulbs to replace with LED in your home. Many times, people purchase LED bulbs for comfort spaces in their home – places with warm and relaxing tones and minimal blue light. Many LED lights are not designed with this level of comfort in mind, so it is important to notice the measure of the Kelvin on the box to determine the “light appearance” (the color of light) that the bulb produces.
EnergyEarth has created a useful graphic for visualizing which level of Kelvin (K) would be best for your preference of light appearance throughout your home. For example, we suspect that bulbs with a Kelvin level in the “Warm White” range are more suited to the atmosphere of a family living room. See the graphic here:
For brightness, the level of lumens (lm) labeled on the box of bulbs you plan to purchase will help you determine how bright the bulb will shine in your home. Here is a range of lumen (lm) measurements recommended for each space within a typical home (via Houselogic):
● Kitchens: 5,000-10,000 total lumens
● Bathrooms: 4,000-8,000 total lumens
● Bedrooms: 2,000-4,000 total lumens
● Living rooms: 1,500-3,000 lumens
● Dining rooms: 3,000-6,000 lumens
● Home offices: 3,000-6,000 lumens
These ranges are broad, but the point of this list is to help illustrate the total of bulb brightness needed to fill a room. It is key to include the right amount of bulbs, which add up to a total number of lumens that make the room comfortable and useable. Hence, the lighting of a kitchen, a place where domestic work like cooking and cleaning is done, requires a higher total of lumens than a bedroom requires.
We don’t want to promise that replacing the incandescent bulbs in your home will be a cheap fix. Some would even consider it a small investment, as the bulbs can run around $10 each. Still, there are two huge benefits of making this transition that will unfold for your home in the long-run: reducing your carbon footprint and immediately decreasing your monthly electric bill. Who wouldn’t want that?
