LED lighting
Another major light fixture has bitten the dust. Our kitchen light fixture had 3x60watt incandescent bulbs. It was really never enough light for the kitchen and so when we came across an LED fixture at Lowes last week, we bought it.
We are replacing 180 watts (about 2400 lumens) of incandescent with 57 watts (about 4200 lumens) of LED in a 42″ long fixture. The longer length helps eliminate and soften shadows on the counters. The fixture is centrally located in the ceiling and the old one was more point source and caused more shadowing than the new one.
At $160 before taxes, an estimated 2 hours/day use, and an estimated $.20 kwh, we estimate it will pay for itself in 8 years, more if we use the lights more than 2 hours/day. That’s about a 12% return on investment.
We had already replaced the old dimmer switch with an LED compatible one.
Not only does it use less power, but we now have maximum light levels that are a lot more useful. The minimum light level with the LED dimmer is only about 15-25% of max, making it bright enough to see but not blind at night. In addition, the colour temperature of the light is much whiter than the older lighting, better in the kitchen for judging the colour of food.