At the Bremerton Rendezvous during Andrews Electrical 101 presentation I had mentioned aloud that incandescent bulbs would no longer be available for purchase starting in Jan 2012. Actually, this is only partly true as you will still be able to purchase an incandescent bulb if it's 100 watts or less. Come Jan 2014 all incandescent bulbs will no longer be available for purchase. Halogen and LED lights will be the order of the day starting Jan 2014.
I found this out by enquiring at Home Depot today in the electrical department. They are selling a lot of LED lights now, but they are pretty pricey and some top out at around $42.
For kicks I did buy two small mercury-free LED lights for $17 to try them out. The packaging said the LED lights were dimmable and produced some 510 lumens, would last for 25,000 hrs using just 8 watts. Under normal use it claimed the bulb should last 23 years. 😀 Hmmm, that would mean 1,087 use hours per year or some 3 use hours per day. The 2x 510 lumens would be sufficient for my family room lamp being used with the 2x 75 watt halogen IMO.
I replaced two 75 watt halogen bulbs that had cost me $10 with these two 8 watt LED lights. So using 6 hrs per day of use and using $0.12 per KwH the savings should be around 294 KwH per year or some $35 per year. This means the payback is about 6 months. Over the 12 year lifespan of the bulbs (6 hrs per day) the savings would amount to around $415, and this is just for installing two LED lights.
I have a total of 60 bulbs being used at my house. So just assuming they could be replaced with the same LEDs I bought today and being used 6 hrs per day the annual KwH savings would be some 294*60/2 or 8,820 or some $1,058 per year. This amounts to 235 gals of diesel fuel at $4.50/gal for my R-25. 🙂
Now let's hope the Utility Co. do not raise rates to maintain their revenues... 🙁
I found this out by enquiring at Home Depot today in the electrical department. They are selling a lot of LED lights now, but they are pretty pricey and some top out at around $42.
For kicks I did buy two small mercury-free LED lights for $17 to try them out. The packaging said the LED lights were dimmable and produced some 510 lumens, would last for 25,000 hrs using just 8 watts. Under normal use it claimed the bulb should last 23 years. 😀 Hmmm, that would mean 1,087 use hours per year or some 3 use hours per day. The 2x 510 lumens would be sufficient for my family room lamp being used with the 2x 75 watt halogen IMO.
I replaced two 75 watt halogen bulbs that had cost me $10 with these two 8 watt LED lights. So using 6 hrs per day of use and using $0.12 per KwH the savings should be around 294 KwH per year or some $35 per year. This means the payback is about 6 months. Over the 12 year lifespan of the bulbs (6 hrs per day) the savings would amount to around $415, and this is just for installing two LED lights.
I have a total of 60 bulbs being used at my house. So just assuming they could be replaced with the same LEDs I bought today and being used 6 hrs per day the annual KwH savings would be some 294*60/2 or 8,820 or some $1,058 per year. This amounts to 235 gals of diesel fuel at $4.50/gal for my R-25. 🙂
Now let's hope the Utility Co. do not raise rates to maintain their revenues... 🙁