Tips on Lighting a Home With LED Lights

Buy Quality

• LEDs promise illumination quality, energy efficiency and long lifetime, but there are good products and marginal ones. The first level of confidence is finding a product with a "Lighting Facts" label. Like a nutrition label, a lighting facts label provides basic facts about what's in the box. A second level of confidence is an Energy Star rating -- a mark indicating the light has been tested for light output, efficiency, and lifetime. Lists of quality products can be found on the Energy Star and Lighting Facts websites.

Check First About Dimming

• Most consumers like the idea of being able to match the brightness of their home lighting to the mood or the occasion. Incandescent lights are dimmed by cutting off a portion of the voltage for a short time of each cycle of the alternating current that drives them. This works for incandescent bulbs, because they don't respond quickly enough to turn off in the short time the voltage has been cut off. If LEDs are driven by the same current, they will visibly flicker. Some LEDs are dimmable, but even those won't necessarily work with a standard dimmer switch. Check to see that the LED and the dimmer switch are compatible.

Maximize Light Output

• Although LEDs are far more efficient than incandescent bulbs, that's just a measure of how much light they put out for a given amount of electrical power. Although less than 10 percent of the energy burned by an incandescent bulb goes to make visible light, a 100-watt incandescent bulb, for example, can still put out 1,700 lumens. LED replacement bulbs use only 12 watts -- and about 30 percent or more of their energy goes into visible light -- but they put out about 800 lumens, equivalent to a 60-watt incandescent. Although LEDs put out less total light, they can be made directional, to deliver light just where it's needed. Consider options other than one-for-one replacement bulbs to take full advantage of LED capabilities.

Utilize Color Control

• Some white LEDs are always white; other white LEDs are actually several different color LEDs put together. A red-green-blue -- or RGB -- LED can be adjusted to create different colors, a level of control not offered by fluorescent or incandescent bulbs. Evaluate areas within the home where changing the color of the illumination will enhance the environment.

Know Advanced Controls

• White lights of any sort are characterized by their color temperature, an indication of where they are on the scale between the dull red of an electric stove burner and the blazing blue of an electric welding torch. The sun, for example, has a color temperature of 5,000 K -- about 8,500 degrees F -- while incandescent bulbs are around 2,300K. Although LEDs create their light differently, the correlated color temperature is an indication of the kind of white they supply. Read the lighting facts label and select a color appropriate for the application -- although keep in mind that LEDs can offer the ability to change this also.

Expect a Higher Cost

• LEDs are new technology, and their energy efficiency and high controllability come at a cost. When factoring the lifetime -- up to a decade or more is possible -- the total cost of ownership is more than competitive with incandescents, but the initial outlay is higher. That's why making sure the lighting of choice is a quality product is so important.