Hi. I'm building a new home in Southlake, TX. One of my friends told me to consider LED's throughout the house. Others say you won't get your money out of the due to the increased cost of the bulbs. I'm sure the first question needed to answer this appropriately is for how long will we live there? Answer...I don't know. We might be there 3 years, or 20. I hope it's the latter. Any thoughts on the added expense vs the savings in electrical bills. The house will be about 5,700 sq feet by the way.
If you're worried about making the house more energy-efficient, I would look at other far-larger energy measures such as insulation, quality weatherstripping, lower-loss windows, seasonally-controlled attic vents, and of course the most efficient air conditioning units you can buy. Lighting cost is going to amount to a rounding error on your climate control and other major appliances and will be hard to detect with seasonal variations.
That being said, you specifically asked about lighting. There are two major costs associated with any electrical appliance -
cost of acquisition (sticker price) and
cost of operation (cost of electricity), summing for
Total Cost of Ownership (TCO).
About costs using 60W incandescent equivalent bulbs (we'll assume cheap $0.10/kWH electricity):
- Incandescent (60W) costs $0.50 to acquire, uses 60 kWH per 1000 hours ($6), and lasts 2000 hours ($12 operating) for a TCO of $18
- Halogen (43W) costs $1.25 to acquire, uses 43 kWH per 1000 hours ($4.30), and has a TCO of $5.55
- CFL (15W) costs $2.00 to acquire, uses 15 kWH per 1000 hours ($1.50), and lasts 8000 hours ($12 operating) for a TCO of $14
- LED (10W) costs $15.00 to acquire, uses 10 kWH per 1000 hours ($1), and lasts 24,000 hours ($24 operating) for a TCO of $39
Note that these TCO figures are based on different lifespans. You'll need 12 Incandescent bulbs, 24 halogen bulbs, or 3 CFL bulbs to last as long as one of our nominal LED bulb, so the
long basis TCO for incan, halogen, CFL, and LED are $150, $133, $42, and $39 respectively.
The lighting technology itself:
- Incandescent lights have the lowest sticker price of all the common lighting technologies, but due to their higher operating wattages have the highest cost of operation. Moderately sensitive to on-off cycling. Generally considered to be the most aesthetically pleasing, although some of this is due to its near-century run as the only viable lighting technology for most residential fixtures.
- Halogen lights are similar to incandescent except they trade a marginal bump in efficiency for a shorter operating life.
- CFL generally has the lowest TCO if it hits its rated lifespan, but typically still beats incandescent and halogen should it only last as long as those bulbs due to its much lower operating cost. Very sensitive to on-off cycling. General consensus is that lighting quality is lowest with CFL, although if you buy better than the cheapest bulbs you can get much better quality.
- LED is a moving target right now due to its rapidly-changing retail price. It' can be below CFL on TCO, but is dependent upon hitting its long rated lifespan. Lowest sensitivity to on-off cycling. The light quality of LED is subject to much debate and varies from model to model; that being said. in blind A-B tests most people have difficulty telling the difference between a good-quality "warm" LED and an incandescent bulb. 120hz flicker can be an issue with some LED bulbs - an issue for some.
Lights that operate steadily for many hours a day every day will see operating cost exceed sticker price by many times over. You will probably want to look at light sources that generate the most lumens for the least watts in these applications so as to minimize TCO. Long operating lifespan will be a benefit in these applications, but isn't necessarily a requirement.
Lights that are used intermittently (closets, utility spaces) for short time periods will likely die from cycling or some other failure long before they hit their rated lifespan, thus a lower sticker price will probably produce the lowest TCO.
There will also be lights that don't fit neatly into either of the previous categories, such as hallway lights, dining room lights, etc. For some of these, usage might be high enough to justify something more efficient; for others usage will be somewhat low enough or aesthetic concerns will outweigh efficiency arguments.
As was mentioned earlier, I would just get regular socketed fixtures installed rather than purpose-build LED fixtures - the industry has yet to settle on commercial-lighting standards for LED, to say nothing of residential fixtures. The ability to replace the key lighting elements themselves will remain important for many years to come until the industry addresses this via adoption ot meaningful modularity ala what
Zhaga is trying to achieve.
CFL bulbs are a biohazard waiting to happen
There are plenty of other reasons to dislike CFL's - why throw out the mercury argument? Using the
because it contains mercury standard, one should also be gravely concerned about linear floro bulbs omnipresent in most kitchens and garages, most flat-panel displays/monitors, and analog thermostats. I've yet to see any evidence of a significant number of mercury poisonings from CFL's or even linear floros.
If incandescents are available, that would be my suggested because they are a 100th of the cost of an LED light bulb
Yes they cost much less to
acquire, but are much more expensive to
operate than LED/CFL unless your electricity is free.
Avoid GU24 outlets, can't stand those..
Yeah, options in GU24 are rather sparse.
