Reduce your energy costs with LED lighting

Energy is a commodity that is required by everyone, both at home, in the workplace, for recreational activities or when in the wider environment. The energy being used could be for heating, for cooling, operating the appliances or for providing illumination during the hours of darkness.

In considering electrical energy, many uses of energy are just used in the background such as for providing power to appliances, however with providing electric illumination, this is a very visible use of energy and as such offers an opportunity to reduce the electrical usage related to lighting fittings.

In considering the home environment, being the place to start as this is where the cost is paid by the homeowner, and where in previous times, the availability of light fittings to provide illumination was limited by the available technology of the time and until fairly recently, this technology was limited to that of filament lamps, either as standard lamps for installation into pendants or later as halogen lamps for installation into fittings such as downlights. In those times energy costs were fairly low and energy usage was fairly high as the efficacy of the light source being used was low and if more light was needed, then it was just simply by adding more Watts, either as more fittings or in replacing the lamp with one of a greater power. Thankfully these days are gone and with the development and introduction of solid-state lighting technology (LED) towards the end of the last century, the opportunity to have energy efficient lighting in the home has now become widely available.

The installation of LED lighting across the home, will in itself significantly reduce the energy consumption on a like for like basis, probably by around 75%, however, even though that is considered to be a sizeable reduction in cost, many homeowners have used this reduction as an opportunity to change the lighting to LED, but in doing so have removed the pendant and installed other forms of lighting with an increased the number of lighting points, meaning that the savings may not now be as first thought.

Whilst this increase in lighting points allows for the homeowner to vary the lighting depending on the time of day, the availability of natural daylight and the tasks being carried out, it is the removal of manual switching in favour of a smart lighting solution which will offer both the opportunity to have optimum control of providing qualitative light when and where it is needed, and in a quantitative amount for adequate illumination.

The installation of an appropriate smart lighting system, such as OCTO from Ansell Lighting, will when using the system to its full potential, allow the homeowner to gain the aesthetic benefit of having a lighting system which can be programmed and controlled according to need to provide quality illumination so as to provide the homeowner with the benefits of enhancing their daily lives, whilst also maximising the opportunity to reduce energy usage and thereby having a reduced electricity bill.