Nationwide, about 20 to 25 percent of our electrical use is for lighting so our homes are a good place to conserve energy and save money. Homebuilders have gotten the message from buyers and are doing a lot to build in efficient lighting systems, like motion sensors to turn lights off.
“Typically a bulb that runs at sixty watts might use around $5 of electricity a year and if we have a motion detector on it we can cut that use down to a quarter or a third so we're looking at a direct savings anytime you install one of those over the life of the switch,” said Paul Crovella, SUNY ESF.
Dimmer switches, while used mostly for accent lighting, but dimming a bulb also reduces energy use.
Builders are also switching to a different kind of light.
Nationwide, about 20-25 percent of our electrical use is for lighting so our homes are a good place to conserve energy and save money. Homebuilders have gotten the message from buyers and are doing a lot to build in efficient lighting systems, like motion sensors to turn lights off. Terry Ettinger has more.
“Well some of the features that we noticed earlier include using fluorescent lighting which is much more efficient that incandescent lighting so there are opportunities in your home where you need lighting to work, like on countertops or in closets where decor isn't so important and it provides a big savings in energy,” said Crovella.
Improvements have been made in the quality of light produced by the energy efficient bulbs and fluorescents and SUNY-ESF professor Paul Crovella says the "instant on" problem is being resolved.
“Yeah, instant on has been a concern for compact fluorescents so there's definitely an effect when you turn on a fluorescent and it takes awhile to reach its full intensity. But one type of light out there now that is efficient and is competing with compact fluorescents is LED lighting,” said Crovella.
LED stands for light emitting diodes, they are energy efficient and when you hit the button it's on as bright as you want it to be.