Monday, March 16, 2009

Lightbulbs...replace with green alternatives...or not?

I have a confession to make, I have 123 sockets inside my house and 37 outside. Together I have 160 different sockets that require light bulbs. No wonder they have to strip mine coal...just for my house!

That means that lighting for me is an ongoing project that started eight years ago when I remodeled this house. I used my first Compact Fluorescents (CFLs) then. I have learned a lot about bulbs since.

I have four kinds of switches for those bulbs. On-off, dimmable, motion sensing, and three way. Unfortunately, this is important to your green bulb choices.

First the easy part…there isn't, that I can find, any energy saving bulb technology, including CFLs and LED bulbs that work properly with motion or light sensors. If you find some, let me know as my exterior security lights are motion sensing and on at least until bedtime. That's expensive. Those cool indoor switches for a closet etc that come on when you enter? Won't work either.

On-off switches are pretty easy once you know what the rules of thumb are:
  1. Don't buy bright white or natural light CFLs, the light is terrible unless used behind a softening shade. Buy soft white. (2700k).
  2. Buy more output in lumens than the incandescent bulb you are replacing. The CFLs are always weaker than advertised.
  3. Note that any sockets you have that require a smaller, shorter profile incandescent (refrigerator bulbs, ceiling fans, sconces) usually can't be replaced effectively with a fluorescent because they always have the integral transformer that makes them too long. This also applies to the newer CFLs that look like spotlight bulbs, beware of can lights etc because the bulb will stick out below the trim. Measure first, buy second.
  4. Home Depot, Wall-Mart etc only carry a small subset of what's available in the market, lighting stores and online sources have a much wider array and the newest stuff.
Three way switches are getting easier. There are decent CFL, soft white, three way bulbs for lamps. If your shade is the kind that clamps on the bulb, it won’t work and if you have "harps" to connect the shade to the lamp, it must be wide enough to take the larger CFL. Some CFLs come with small brackets to help make the harp work but I haven't ever needed them.

Dimmed switch sockets are becoming much easier to retrofit. The new dimmable soft white CFL bulbs are great as long as they fit your fixture. It's worth noting that a dimmed incandescent saves energy too. However, because of the way they light, a half dimmed bulb uses more than half power.

There are some new dimmable CFLs that are housed in the "spotlight" looking form factor. I have two from different manufacturers. They are specified in both light color, and light amount, to replace halogen PAR type bulbs. They don't and aren't. They are a very disappointing product. They do dim, but only partially. They are of course too long and stick below my can light trim and the light quality is weak at best.

They might be good for something but PAR halogen lamp replacement isn't one of them.

Bottom Line #1 - Buying energy saving bulbs is way harder and you need to be informed to get a satisfactory result. Your switch type and bulb size dictate a lot.


Each CFL contains a very small amount of mercury. If you break a bulb you can capture this mercury and apply it to your fish directly and cut out all the middle men. Actually, you do want to dispose of these bulbs properly. Home Depot, Wall-Mart etc have recycling bins just for this purpose and will take bulbs you bought anywhere. If you break one, just sweep it into a zip lock baggy and take it to the Depot.

But that's why everyone is so breathlessly waiting for LED to become affordable. No mercury. But based on my test of four different LED bulbs, they have many of the same problems as CFL's. They don’t dim, the light quality is harsh in many cases, and they are odd form factors due to heat dissipation requirements (that I don't really understand). The promise is they will provide more light for less watts and last a long time. But, they are currently very expensive. They can be justified in commercial applications where there are large numbers left on for long periods of time (12 hours etc.) but not for most homeowner applications.

Bottom Line #2 - LEDs wont be an answer for us homeowners for awhile...(if ever).

I bought a bulb at the Depot recently from Phillips that is a halogen replacement that's advertised as 30% cheaper to run. And it's a halogen bulb! So it's dimmable etc...Works great but I can’t vouch for its lower energy use.

Bottom Line #3 - The energy savings from CFLs is impressive, the better ones last a long time and costs have come way down. They make a difference everywhere they work as well or better than an incandescent. If they don't, don't compromise the quality of light or appearance just for the sake of feeling green. Our homes and especially the lighting go a long way towards our quality of life and sense of well being. It's been proven, we are emotionally light sensitive. Let the manufacturers figure out how to give us what we need and want, and don't feel guilty about not having CFLs everywhere.

7 comments:

  1. I switched my outdoor lights (one by the door and a lamp post type thing at the garage) over the CFLs. I keep the door one off unless I am going out, because if I am unexpectedly late getting back so that I don't have it on, I can see well enough with the lamp post thing to get in the house. (Does that parse :-)

    This is slightly wasteful with the lamp post light, since it goes on at dusk and off at dawn, but I just feel a bit better with a modest amount of outside light. Not to be confused with the people who feel they have to floodlight their yards and keep every animal and the neighbors up.

    I did reduce the wattage compared to the incandescents. It took quite awhile to find a yellow bug light CFL for the lamp post, GE makes them.

    I have a couple of LED nightlights for the bathrooms that go on via photocells. But I bought a Energizer Light on Demand which contains LEDs. That's the kind of light that goes on automatically in a power failure. It is horrible light. I don't notice the blueness of the little nightlights, but in the bigger Energizer light it is skull shattering. I thought LEDs came in different colors, so why they chose to use this one instead of something warmer, is beyond me.

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  2. I too have lots of exterior lights that are on simple switches that are all CFLs now. I leave them on when we are out at night and don't feel guilty.

    As for the LEDs, apparently, making a white LED is the hardest. Colors are easy and sometimes reflected in the price. Some newer bulbs are "soft white" and I believe this is either accomplished through a lens or by integrating colored LEDs to enhance the "warmth".

    I was at our green energy store here and they had LED lighted slippers for those night forays...

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  3. A good way to avoid too many costs for outside lights = timer. Your HD or Lowes carry electronic, programmable switch, that fit in a "decora" wall plate, can be programmed to adapt on the winter/summer time and can be overriden by pushing on them, like a normal on/off switch, a minimal investment at 35$ or so, although I am sure I paid 23$ for mine!(http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=10051&langId=-1&catalogId=10053&productId=100267677)

    Also, I have changed most of my bulbs to CFL, inside and outside (a total of 100+ bulbs) and I have the same problem with dimmable, recessed lights. I found some small halogenes, that are 35W and have a screw back instead of these 2 pins. They fit right in place of bigger spot lights and provide way enough light. Specially if you are looking at a "cosy" lighting like a TV room. They probably would not replace flood light but they work for some applications (http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=10051&langId=-1&catalogId=10053&productId=100493734) and if I take my TV room that had 10 of these with regular 75W bulbs, I reduced the consumption by 60%, but can assure you I have the same amount of light

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  4. The Depot is how I got into this fix. They sell, almost exclusively these outdoor lights from Heath that have a motion sensor, day night sensor, a timer and something they call Dual Bright. It's everything you want basically.

    What happens is they only come on at dusk. Once on, they go to half bright for a set period of time, for me I have them set at four hours. This lights my backyard and driveway nicely. Then around bedtime they turn off. Any time (after dark) motioned is sensed they go to full bright again with a user set timer.

    So, if they were off and only coming on when motion is sensed then they aren't on long enough to worry about. But mine are on for four hours, I have three fixtures of two bulbs each.

    I talked to the manufacturer twice and got two different stories. One said dimming bulbs would work. The other said they all might work, as they have tested them successfully but it seems the fixtures shorten the life of the bulbs.

    Right now I have two dimming CFL bulbs in one that come on, stay on until bedtime??? The other has two dimming CFLs and it stays off except for motion??? They have the same specs but are two different model numbers. (Maybe the reason for the confusion at Heath.) I bought a third version, same specs but I haven't installed it yet where the other energy gobbler halogen fixture is.

    Those halogens line voltage? I cant get the URL to work...says the product isn't available.

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  5. Mark, yes they are line voltage - they are 120V. If look on Home Depot's website they are labelled as "GE Halogen 35-Watt Curio PAR16" and they are 3$ cheaper on Lowe's website (damn!)
    If you go to Google and look for "GE Halogene Curio" you will get plenty of links.
    Mat

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  6. Thanks!

    I will check it out. Try the Neptune dimmables when you get a chance.

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  7. Mat, I had some of those fits in a wall plate timers. Every time there was a power failure, the timers bellied up and had to be replaced... Maybe they don't all do that.

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