From Guest Blogger Lillian Connors: How Earth-Friendly Are LED Lighting Solutions?
LED light bulbs have become quite popular with both designers and consumers of eco-friendly technologies, lately. They have basically become the norm when it comes to green home design. In some countries they’re even government mandated.
Is this justified? Well, it’s hard to really say, because they are better than the alternatives, but as with everything else, new technologies solve some problems, but they create others in the meantime.
What is LED?
LED stands for light-emitting diode. It products light from a semi-conductor, instead of a vacuum (like incandescent bulb) or gas (like CFL). These light bulbs reduce energy use, because they don’t lose too much energy on heat (in these terms it’s 85 percent more efficient than incandescent bulbs and 5 percent more efficient than CFL bulbs). They’re also more durable than the traditional light bulbs, which need to be changed on a regular basis. The average lifespan of LED light is 30,000 hours. This means you can have the light on for 20 years before you need to change it. They’re more expensive in the short term, but in the long run the benefits are substantial.
Lighting
When the average consumer chooses light bulbs, they’re more interested in lumens than watts. Watts tell you nothing about the quality of lighting and its brightness and that’s all that really matters to the buyer. There is a slight difference in the lighting quality, but it can be reduced with innovative technology, like putting micro holes in the casing. This issue was more prominent with the earlier version of this technology and it’s stuck in people’s mind. Nowadays, energy-efficient LED panel light solutions can easily be used to brighten vast spaces, such as those in commercial buildings.
Savings
Led light bulbs aren’t only good for the environment – they’re good for your wallet as well. Take the average family, which uses around 10 light bulbs for about 10 hours every day. Replacing all the light bulbs with LED ones will decrease the spending more than ten times. Depending on the price of the light bulbs, after about six months they pay for themselves. Obviously, the light bulbs don’t have to be changed all at once, you can do it periodically, if that’s easier on your budget in the short term.
Downsides
As with everything else, LED lights have their downsides. They’re made out of some risky substances. When Christmas lights, traffic lights, car headlights and brake lights were tested, traces of lead, nickel and copper were found. The amounts are larger than in traditional lights, but they’re still far from dangerous. Experts say that inhaling, let alone being exposed to that amounts of those metals won’t be hazardous. Although, they also say, you should throw away broken lights as soon as they break.
LED lights and wildlife
Only 10 percent of street lights are LEDs at this point, but the effect of the lights on the wildlife has been the subject of much debate. Human made objects have considerable effect on wildlife in the cities, especially nocturnal wildlife, such as bugs, bats and owls. These species lose hunting abilities in areas where LED lights are prolific. Insects don’t buzz around these lights, so these can be the issues for opportunistic predators, such as spiders as well. In the same time lower light pollution can be good for other animals, such as hyenas on the edges of towns.
Switching from traditional to LED lights is better for the environment overall and it’s a good way to save some money on the electric bill. While there are still some issues to be resolved, LED lights are the superior alternative.
Like most articles on efficient lighting, this article fails to point out that there are situations where the only light source that makes sense is incandescent. Not all lights should be CFL or LED.
Of course efficient lighting is important where the lights have significant “on” time. However, there are lights which are seldom used or used only for brief intervals. For example, closet lights, although they may be used frequently, are generally on for less than an minute at a time. The total daily “on” time for a closet light may be less than two minutes. In that situation, the amount of power used is so trivial that it should be ignored and incandescent lights should be used. On the other hand, when lights are on for long intervals, the reduction in air conditioning costs makes CFL and LED lighting even more advantageous.
Fluorescent lights, whether CFLs or traditional tubes, lose considerable life when they are constantly turned on and off and, when they are turned on and off frequently, may have their lives so shortened that incandescent lights would last longer. Fortunately, LED lighting doesn’t have that problem. But when LED lights are used only briefly, their cost is such that the interest on the investment would exceed the savings in electricity used.
To sum up, where the total “on” time of lights is very little, use incandescent lights. Where the total “on” time is very long, use only CFL or LED lights.
It is unclear why articles on lighting ignore these rather obvious points unless the writers think that readers lack sufficient intelligence to understand it.
Here is a quotation from an article about CFLs:
“…. Apparently, projected CFL lifespans are based on a three-hour run time per start. In other words, during CFL testing, bulbs are cycled on for three hours and off for 20 minutes until half the samples have failed. If you turn them on frequently for less than three hours at a time — as I do in my bathroom — you’re in for a surprise.
” ‘Incandescents are somewhat immune to the number of times you switch them on and off,’ Leslie says, ‘but the electrodes inside a CFL are stressed with each burst of starting voltage, and will eventually degrade and fail. With a CFL, the number of starts is the primary factor for determining how long it will last; the number of burning hours is secondary. A CFL rated at 10,000 hours in the three-hour-on standard test might last only 4,000 hours if left on for only 15 minutes per start.'”
Here is the source of the quotation:
https://www.houselogic.com/remodel/painting-lighting/cfls-light-bulbs/