LED bulbs are one of the most basic and essential ways to improve a building’s energy efficiency. These days, replacing traditional bulbs with their LED alternatives is a no-brainer, and most businesses are taking advantage of this proven technology to reduce their energy consumption and improve the environment of their locations.
Yet, some people can still feel a bit hesitant to make the LED plunge, because when they started to become popular years ago, LED bulbs were significantly more expensive and often not as attractive. These days, though, technology has come a long way, and they are now affordable and welcoming—in addition to providing easy energy savings.
So, what exactly are LED s and how do they work? Why do they use less energy? And what innovations are being made in the field of LEDs to further improve their performance? Those are the questions we’ll answer in this blog post.
Before we explain how LED bulbs work, it’s important to understand how traditional, incandescent bulbs work. It’s actually fairly simple: incandescent lights work by sending electricity through a thin wire until it gets so hot that it emits light.
LEDs are a bit more complex. LED stands for “light emitting diode.” A diode is a piece of material that only allows electricity to move in one direction. During this process, the electrons shed photons—which are essentially particles of light—thereby lighting up the bulb. The main thing to understand about this process is that—unlike incandescent bulbs where a lot of heat is generated to create the light—minimal heat is generated in an LED.
In light bulbs, heat is wasted energy. Because LEDs avoid producing heat, all the electricity they consume goes towards exclusively producing light. So, to generate the same amount of brightness in an incandescent and an LED bulb, the LED will need a lot less electricity.
In fact, LEDs are about 90% more efficient than incandescent lights.
Because they require less energy to produce the same amount of light, adopting LEDs is an easy way to reduce your energy consumption. Especially when you’re running a business—lighting multiple rooms, and maybe parking lots, constantly for hours on end—the impact of installing LEDs can be astronomical. They are good for business and the environment.
Check out the annual cost difference of a single, small bulb when replaced with an LED.
Another huge benefit of LED bulbs is that they need to be changed much less often. Incandescent bulbs are prone to burning out, but LEDs have a long lifespan. The average incandescent bulb should last about 1,200 hours, but these days LED bulbs can last 50,000 to 100,000 hours. That is a significant difference that can help simplify your operations and create less work for your employees who would be tasked to replace them.
These days, LED bulbs are continuing to be developed with more advanced technologies and further benefits for businesses. Efficiency is continuing to be improved, and new features are being added to make managing business lighting simpler.
For example, some LEDs now include technology that lets you control your lights remotely via an app and provides the ability to have your lights on timers and to set them to turn off and on at certain times of the day. This means your lights will only work when they need to, saving your business energy. Plus, new developments are being made that will allow for dimming and for scheduling variable brightness levels throughout the day. This will help ensure your lights only use as much energy as absolutely necessary throughout the day and take efficiency to the next level.
If you're interested in taking advantage of some of this new technology, and getting energy saving LED bulbs for your business, it’s easy. With Budderfly, you can get it all—without any upfront cost. We’ve partnered with more that 4,500 businesses across the U.S. to provide no-cost energy efficient equipment upgrades (not just lights, but HVAC, refrigeration controls, and solar, too) to help reduce energy consumption. Contact us today to learn more!