From Guest Blogger Diana Smith: Top Five Eco-Friendly Lighting Swaps for Your Home

Lighting is one of the most important aspects of every indoor space which means that you’ll always have to choose the best lighting options for every room in your home. In case you also want to go green, opting for solutions that’ll reduce your energy consumption is necessary. Listed below are 5 swaps you can make that are guaranteed to make your home more eco-friendly and reduce your energy bills.

Change the Bulbs

We all know that standard incandescent bulbs are no longer the only option you have when it comes to choosing your bulbs. LED bulbs are becoming more and more popular and it actually makes a lot of sense when you start thinking about it. LED bulbs consume less energy and last longer which makes them a great choice for every homeowner. Additionally, LED bulbs are also more flexible when it comes to design and color, so making them go well with the rest of your home should never be too difficult.
Use Motion Sensors

Many of us tend to forget to turn off the light when we leave a room. If this is the case with you, thinking about installing motions sensors might be a great idea. Needless to say, not having a light turned on when you’re not in the room can drastically reduce your carbon footprint, and what’s best about it is that switching to motion sensors is quite an easy project to take on. All you have to do is replace your standard light switches with the sensors that detect motion.
Use Solar Energy

Even if it doesn’t seem like it, the lighting options around your garden tend to use a lot of energy as well. However, these days you don’t have to use electricity in order to be able to see around your garden at night. There are plenty of solar-powered garden lights that look exactly like standard solutions and provide you with all the light you need. What they do is collect energy from the sun during the day and use it to turn the lamps on during the night. Even if you think lamps like this are expensive, once you think about it long-term, going solar might seem like a smart investment after all.
Get LED Stick-on Lights

Going green doesn’t mean you’ll have to eliminate any lighting fixture in your home. If you’re using overhead lights for small spaces such as closets, you can just replace them with more energy-efficient ones. LED stick-on lights are constantly becoming more popular and they can be found in most of the homes. Moreover, they are battery-powered and you can position them anywhere you want. The batteries used for stick-on lights are rechargeable, which means that you will get plenty of lighting in small spaces for a minimal cost.
Buy Eco-Friendly Fixtures

It’s not just the bulbs you can switch to make your home greener – there are plenty of lighting fixtures that are “energy star” certified. Those kinds of products use fluorescent light which can last much longer than standard lights. Besides that, they are usually made of recycled or recyclable materials, which makes them an obvious choice for anyone who wants to go green. On the other hand, sometimes these fixtures can be difficult to install so you might have to rely on electrical contractors to do it for you.

Go for all of these swaps and your carbon footprint is guaranteed to reduce. Of course, there’s no reason to stop there. There are many eco-friendly solutions available at market, and you should always aim at making your entire home more energy-efficient.