The basics of LED bulbs and why you shouldn’t ignore them

Although the evidence for upgrading your home or business to use LED light bulbs is somewhat overwhelming and commonplace, some people still will not be aware of the huge cost saving benefits they are missing out on.  LED’s have become the standard product being used wherever there is a need for lightbulbs in newly built houses and most existing homes and business should consider converting.  Here are the three essential reasons why you should seriously consider the switch to LED lightbulbs if you haven’t already.

LED’s last considerable longer

Standard light bulbs will burn between 2,000 and 20,000 hours but they are fairly unreliable, hence the large range of potential run times.  LED’s on the other hand will consistently last between 50,000 and 100,000 hours, a massive difference and while there is quite a range of run times here as well, the lower number is such an improvement in itself, the difference is of less consequence.

LED’s are very durable

The glass construction of normal light bulbs makes them quite delicate, and sharp knock can shatter the glass and render the bulb useless.  LED’s are made from plastic and so have no such weakness.  They also have numerous small light sources rather than a single large one like incandescent bulbs, so they are much harder to damage.

LED’s are incredibly energy efficient

Incandescent light bulbs are effective enough, but they are horrendously inefficient with their energy usage.  If you’ve ever wondered why incandescent light bulbs get hot, it is because they work by passing a lot of current through a small wire filament, and as such it glows.  This converts the energy passing through it into light, but also heat.  These old fashioned bulbs convert around 80% of the energy they draw into heat, so only 20% of the energy you feed them turns into light.  This means that every ten minutes that light is on would have only cost the same as two minutes if the bulb was 100% efficient.  Now, nothing is 100% efficient but LED bulbs are around 90% efficient, so you can see how much that might save you.

The oft touted downside to LED bulbs is the initial cost of swapping them over.  It is fair to say that the bulbs are more expensive than their standard incandescent equivalents, but they are a much newer technology so this should be expected.  If you buy LED light bulbs online and in bulk from a retailer, then the cost should be significantly lower and further negate the issues of cost.  But consider the sheer saving that you will make by swapping and improving the efficiency of your lights by more than 60%, surely that should be a convincing enough argument without adding that many energy suppliers are offering to cover full or partial costs of replacing light bulbs with LED’s, so that might also be an option.  It must be worth finding out.