Latest Green Tips

Saving on Lighting Cost While Away Use timers on our lights instead of leaving on the porch light. The average household spends about $13 per year per hundred-watt bulb on electricity. If every home in America used a timer for twelve hours a day instead of letting their lights burn 24 / 7 while on vacation, wou could save $187 million in energy costs. /span>
Indoor Lighting Use linear fluorescent tubes and energy efficient compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) in fixtures throughout your home to provide high-quality and high-efficiency lighting. Fluorescent lamps are much more efficient than incandescent (standard) bulbs and last about 6 to 12 times longer.
Outdoor Lighting Tips Because outdoor lights are usually left on a long time, using CFLs in these fixtures will save a lot of energy. Most bare spiral CFLs can be used in enclosed fixtures that protect them from the weather.
Outdoor Lighitn Tips - Part 2 CFLs are also available as flood lights. These models have been tested to withstand the rain and snow so they can be used in exposed fixtures. Most though, cannot be used with motion detectors.
LED—A New Kind of Light Light emitting diodes, or LEDs, offer better light quality than incandescent bulbs, last 25 times as long, and use even less energy than CFLs. View our new line of LED ight bulbs here: USLP LED Lgihting
Benefits of LED lightbulbs
- Long-lasting - LED bulbs last up to 10 times as long as compact fluorescents, and far longer than typical incandescents. Durable - since LEDs do not have a filament, they are not damaged under circumstances when a regular incandescent bulb would be broken. Because they are solid, LED bulbs hold up well to jarring and bumping.
- Cool - these bulbs do not cause heat build-up; LEDs produce 3.4 btu's/hour, compared to 85 for incandescent bulbs. This also cuts down on air conditioning costs in the home.
- Mercury-free - no mercury is used in the manufacturing of LEDs.
- More efficient - LED light bulbs use only 2-10 watts of electricity (1/3rd to 1/30th of Incandescent or CFL) Small LED flashlight bulbs will extend battery life 10 to 15 times longer than with incandescent bulbs. Also, because these bulbs last for years, energy is saved in maintenance and replacement costs. For example, many cities in the US are replacing their incandescent traffic lights with LED arrays because the electricity costs can be reduced by 80% or more.
- Cost-effective - although LEDs are expensive, the cost is recouped over time and in battery savings. For the AC bulbs and large cluster arrays, the best value comes from commercial use where maintenance and replacement costs are expensive.
- Light for remote areas - because of the low power requirement for LEDs, using solar panels becomes more practical and less expensive than running an electric line or using a generator for lighting.