We've recently been involved in the creation of an ecommerce website for Rice Products who have embarked on the retail of LED lighting for home and commercial clients.
LED lighting has had a it of stigma of over-priced and under-powered lighting and in all honesty for good reason - the technology had been sorely lacking and in some cases, woeful.
Step up new semi-conductor materials, particularly our old Gallium (yeah I'd never heard of it either) which is particularly good in its exchange of electrons under low voltages - great for creating light with little or no heat and with a double whammy of low energy usage.
As most type of lighting which employs LED technology is retrofit (dimmable ones need special drivers or transformers) this means that typically your 60W or CFL (compact flourescent lighting) low-energy bulb and GU10/MR11 spotlights this means there are normally few issues when it comes to straight swaps for your existing lighting.
One thing which is the "shot in the foot" for LED technology is that it is still relatively expensive to manufacture these lights which means that the upfront cost for a complete substitution of your standard current lighting for LED equivalents can be a pricey undertaking, I reckon for a 20 bulb house you are talking around £180-£200 depending where you shop.
Then it was pointed out to me that, ok you will pay, say £200 for your lighting replacement in one go, but you will reduce your energy usage by up to 85-95%. OK great I say, I'm not that much of a tree-hugger what does that mean to me?
Well look at it this way - you have 20 bulbs of assorted sizes and wattages, say some are 20W low energy CFLS, some are GU10 50W spotlights and the odd 60W standard bulb knocking around a hall cupboard or a centre light in your lounge. Add them all up and you get around 900W of power of which you will use say, 12 hours of half of them so you are running 450W for 12 hours a day. If you changed your bulbs to LED equivalent your wattage would be reduced to around 40W for same amount of time which an amazine 85% reduction in lighting usage in terms of energy. Translate into kWh usage and the currrent tariffs you will save around £25 per month on your lighting bills. Try an online LED energy savings calculator for more ideas about your saving potential
Now the killer point, if you added up all these savings and looked at the savings you will make on the energy usage alone, you will expect to get TOTAL payback within around 12-16 months - that means that the £200 you spent on day one would be completely paid back typically just over a year later. The final dagger in the heart for standard luminescent lighting is lifespan - the typical lifespan for an LED spotlight or bulb is between 3-5 years with typical domestic use. So you would typically replace your GU10 spotlight once a year when it blows, you wouldn't need to replace the LED equivalent for a further 4 years or around 30,000 hours of use.
Need I say anymore? Pop across to Scotland's newest LED lighting website for more information!
