You might be thinking that “How much does LED lighting save in energy bills?” what if we tell you that you can save hundreds of dollar bills by swapping your traditional lights with LEDs? It will be a no-brainer for you, right? But to bring a new change to your home, you must be looking for some figurative explanation.
This article will prove as an ultimate guide to make you go for economical choices. We will discuss the energy and cost savings earned by using LED lighting. We will also compare the LED lights with traditional household lighting like incandescent bulbs, CFLs, or halogen bulbs. So, keep reading till the very end.
LED light bulbs and other lighting products are highly energy-efficient and wallet-friendly. These lights installed in your homes use at least 75% less energy than typical incandescent lighting, and comparatively, these have 25 times longer lives.
This rationale can also extend up to 90%, depending upon the power consumption of your LED bulb. LED lights save much energy due to minimizing heat losses.
They convert only 5% of the energy into heat, while the rest, 95%, is converted to light. In contrast, incandescent lighting shows a completely dark picture. For instance, a 5 watts LED bulb is comparable to a 40 watts filament bulb in terms of brightness and usage. But the expenses of the former one are way too less than the latter one. So, energy savings are the other name of money savings.
Does LED Lighting Save on Energy Bills?
Your energy bills constitute two types of energy costs:
- The upfront cost
- The electricity consumption cost
The upfront cost is briefly discussed in the below section. As far as electricity cost is concerned, it is measured in kilowatt-hours. A kilowatt-hour is the commercial unit of energy equivalent to 1000 watt-hours. Your monthly electricity bill is the units of kilowatt-hour energy used during the whole month multiplied by the average electricity rate of your area.
Let’s compare a 20 watt LED bulb with a 100-watt incandescent bulb, both of them have the same brightness giving 1600 lumens of light. You can get electricity rates from your electricity bills, and the power of the bulb comes rated on it. We can take 0.142$/kWh as an average national rate for the U.S.
If you lit the above stated two bulbs for 8 hours a day each, then the following are the savings that you can make:
| DETAILS | LED BULB | INCANDESCENT BULB |
|---|---|---|
|
Average hours used per day |
8 |
8 |
|
Watts per bulb |
20 |
100 |
|
Energy usage in kWh |
0.16 |
0.8 |
|
Watts used per day |
160 |
800 |
|
Cost per day |
0.02 |
0.11 |
|
Cost per month |
$0.68 |
$3.41 |
|
Cost per year |
$8.29 |
$41.46 |
|
SAVINGS per MONTH per bulb SAVINGS per YEAR per bulb |
|
$2.73 $33.17 |
This amount of $33.17 is the saving for only one bulb replacement. A typical household consists of 40-60 lights. You can multiply the saving of a bulb with the number of bulbs in your home and see the difference.
Almost 20% of your electricity bill accounts for lighting only. These LED lights will save you thousands of dollars that you can use somewhere else to go on a family trip or add some luxury to your home. Plus, this is a one-time investment with years-long fruit.
Isn't LED Lighting Expensive?
After hearing and reading a lot of admiring stuff about LED lighting, you visit electric stores and become shocked to see the prices of these bulbs. You see that incandescent bulbs cost much less than LED ones. For instance, a 10 watt LED bulb costs you 6$ against only 1$ for an equivalent 60-watt incandescent bulb. But this upfront cost can be misleading most of the time.
The thing is, LED lighting might cost more for installation, but it proves very useful in the long run. Let’s see some rough estimations. The rated life of many LED lights is up to 2.85 years (25,000 hours). While a typical incandescent light has a rated life of 50 days (1200 hours), and it is 333.3 days (8,000 hours) for a CFL light.
So, we can say that an ordinary LED bulb competes for 20 incandescent bulbs and 3 CFL bulbs. Now, you must have got the idea that LED lighting is truly worth it, and it is one of the great investments you are going to make.
LED vs Traditional Household Lighting
LED lights are proven safer and more economical than any other lighting in all ways possible. They are safer, produce less heat, and are environment friendly. Moreover, they give you the same brightness as that of incandescent, halogen, or CFLs, using lesser energy. The less use of electricity indicates savings.
Let’s compare all the traditional sources of household lighting with modern LED lights to see the difference.
1-LED Lighting vs Incandescent Lighting:
Incandescent bulbs are the predecessors of Thomas Edison’s filament bulbs. The same to be outdated as well as out of budget nowadays. They are inefficient as compared to LED lighting due to the following reasons:
- They consume 90% of electricity in the heating process while LED’s use only 5-10%
- They are highly fragile while LEDs are compact, relatively
- They are cheaper than LEDs but need to be replaced again and again
- They have nearly 20 times shorter lifespan than LEDs
| Incandescent | LEDs | |
|---|---|---|
|
Lumens per watt |
15 |
72 |
|
Energy usage for 800 lumens |
60 watts |
10 watts |
|
Lifespan |
1200 hours |
50,000 hours |
|
Heat emission |
90% |
10% |
2- LED Lights vs Halogen Lights:
Halogen bulbs are other common bulbs used in households. These bulbs are better in quality as compared to incandescent ones. The halogen gas used in them extends their lifespan and efficiency and burns much hotter. LEDs are cheaper than Halogen lights because:
- Halogen bulbs consume more power as compared to equivalent LED bulbs
- LEDs have an 80-100 lumen per watt ratio as compared to 16-24 lm/W for halogens
- Unlike LEDs, halogen bulbs give off a fixed colour temperature
| Incandescent | LEDs | |
|---|---|---|
|
Lumens per watt |
25 |
72 |
|
Energy usage for 800 lumens |
43 watts |
10 watts |
|
Lifespan |
2,000-4,000 hours |
50,000 hours |
|
Heat emission |
80% |
10% |
3- LED Lights vs CFLs:
The compact fluorescent lights are nearly 30% energy efficient as compared to incandescent bulbs. They ruled for a long time but LED lighting dominated them too. Following are the reason:
- LED lighting is safer as it doesn’t rely on mercury like CFL lighting
- Subsequently, LED bulb can live three times longer than a typical compact fluorescent bulb
- LEDs are better as they provide more bright lighting using comparatively less energy
| CFLs | LEDs | |
|---|---|---|
|
Lumens per watt |
60 |
72 |
|
Energy usage for 800 lumens |
14 watts |
10 watts |
|
Lifespan |
8,000 hours |
50,000 hours |
|
Heat emission |
30% |
10% |
Types of LED Lights You can Switch to!
All the above-stated comparisons prove the highest efficiency of LED lights as compared to other sources. But you might wonder do all kinds of lights in your home can be replaced by LEDs. The simple answer to this question will be “yes”. Here are a few examples for your better understanding:
1-Light Bulbs:
You can replace all kinds of light bulbs used in your home with LED bulbs. Moreover, they come in different colours and all requirements. It could be a bright mirror bulb, faint night bulb, or standard room bulb.
2-Panel Lights:
You can look for durable and sophisticated LED panel lights for your office. They will efficiently replace your previous fluorescent panel lights giving a neat look. You can use them either in a meeting room or in false ceilings to give proper lighting.
3-Tube Lights:
If any of your room has fluorescent tube lights, it needs to be replaced with more energy-efficient, and environment-friendly LED tube lights. These tubes provide light in each corner and thus can also be used in high-ceiling offices.
Why Choose LED Lights?
LED lighting is replacing all its counterparts by providing better quality and lower rates. LED bulbs consume 80% less electricity as compared to halogen sources and incandescent bulbs. In fact, incandescent bulbs are banned in many countries, including China, Japan, and India, to control national energy consumption.
The modern era is the era of LED lighting. LED lights may require expensive installation, but they prove to be cost-efficient in the long run. Light-emitting diodes are designed to produce minimum heat with maximum brightness. They have exceptionally long life spans. A typical LED bulb can stay lit for as long as 40,000-50,000 hours.
Final Words
It was all about the topic “How much do LED lights save in your electricity bills”. We can conclude that lights are the must-haves, which have to be kept on for quite long periods. The popularity of LED lighting these days is resulting in a dramatic decrease in its cost. These lights are durable and equally energy efficient.
LED lights might be expensive than other options, but they are a promising investment. They are indeed the best choice for the safety of your pocket as well as the environment.
You should start replacing your traditional lights with LEDs as soon as possible. Keeping them with care, you won’t need to replace your lights for 3-5 years. This investment is going to be worth it.
After replacement, tell us the answers to the following questions in the comments below:
- How many lights are you going to replace with LED lights?
- How much do you save by making this investment?
