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The Homeowner’s Guide to LED Lighting

Hear from our experts on Everything LED Lighting

Whether you are a first-time or experienced homeowner, the job of operating and maintaining your home can be tiring and headache inducing. From renovations to old furnaces to snow removal and security lights, a lot of time and money go into making your house a home. Today we are going to discuss the benefits of LED lighting in homes, including everything you need to know about what to look for in LED lighting for your home. It’s the homeowner’s guide to LED lighting!

Government Mandated Energy Efficiency

It may come as a shock to you as a homeowner that the federal government passed a law in 2007 mandating light bulbs be at least 25 percent more efficient than incandescent lights. From this mandate was born the popularity of LEDs. LEDs have been on the market since the 1980s, but after this 2007 government mandate, the popularity of CFLs and LEDs rose dramatically, and is still rising today.

LEDs offer amazing energy efficient benefits for homeowners. However, there is a bit of a learning curve when you first begin to shop for LED lighting. Unlike incandescent bulbs, where you merely need to know what wattage of bulb to use, LEDs are a bit more complex.

Some terms to be aware of when shopping for LEDs include lumens, efficacy, CCT and CRI.

What are Lumens?

Lumens are a measure of output of light, whereas watts are the amount of energy needed to send out and create light. The advantage of LEDs over incandescent light bulbs is that it takes far fewer watts to produce the same lumen output. For example, a 60-watt incandescent light creates an output of 800 lumens. A 13-watt LED bulb creates the same output of 800 lumens. As you can see this means you get the same quality of light while using less watts and energy!

What is CCT?

LEDs are notorious for their almost blinding white light. Yet LEDs come in all different colors and color temperatures. You can find LEDs in soft yellows or bright whites, depending on your preference. In this instance, CCT stands for correlated color temperature, a measure of how white an LED light is. The color temperature of the light is based on the Kelvin system. If you prefer a softer yellow light, you should look for LED lights in the 3,000 Kelvin range. If you are looking for a brighter white LED light, look in the 4,000 and 5,000 Kelvin range.

What is CRI?

CRI stand for color rendering index. This refers to how closely a light makes something look like its true color, or the color as seen in bright daylight. Unlike CCT, this has nothing to do with the color of the light, but rather the color of the object in the light. For the colors in your home to pop and resemble their truest shade, look for LED bulbs with a CRI close to 100 for the most accurate color representation. Another great thing about LEDs is that they do not give off any UV rays. Apart from showing your furniture and paint’s truest colors, LEDs also protect them from fading!

Get Your Home’s LED Lighting from Sitler’s!

Whether you’re remodeling or looking to illuminate your home and save some extra cash, come to Sitler’s to find your home’s LED lighting! Give us a call at (319)-519-0039 or send us an email to get started today!

Posted in LED Lighting for the Home