My grandfather Stan used to follow my brother and I around his house yelling, “Why are these lights on? These cost money!”  Well, needless to say, I learned that lesson early on in life and it drives me nuts to see people throwing money and resources down the toilet. If it’s yellow let it mellow!  Sorry I got side tracked.  The only redeeming factor in this energy wasting fiasco is that 8 out the 11 homes with their lights left on had CFL’s.  But, come on! Let’s do the math.  For arguments sake we will assume that the CFLs are 13 watt bulbs, and the incandescents are 40 watt bulbs. Lets also say each house has 2 lights on. (Click Read More to Continue)

40w Incandescent  x 2
24 hrs will use 1.920 KW = $.36
7 days will use 13.440 KW  = $2.55
1 month will use 57.600 KW = $10.94
1 year will use 691.200 KW = $131.32

13w Compact Flourescent x 2
24 hrs will use .624 KW = $.04
7 days will use 4.368 KW = $.83
1 month will use 18.720 KW = $3.56
1 year will use 224.640 KW = $42.68

1 KW @ $.19 average

So, these are the numbers for just two lamps left on, but, like cockroaches, for every one you see there are many more you don’t. Who knows how many lights are left on in the house! Energy conservation is not only good for our environment, but also our pocket books.  Even though the CFL’s use about a third of the energy of an incandescent lamp, it wouldn’t cost my neighbors nearly as much if they would turn off their lights during the day. If their too lazy to do that, then a solution would be to buy a fixture with a photocell.  A photocell is basically a switch that is activated by the sun (daylight-off / night-on). It’s just that simple.  So please, do yourselves a favor and go turn off that light, It’s costing YOU money.

Check back soon for my next articles- where to recycle your CFL’S here in Bakersfield and constructing a homemade solar hot water system.  Solar heated water-DUH!

-Tim  Douhan
Greener Bakersfield Contributor

It all started several months ago with an audit , a walk around the house with my clipboard and an agenda. The agenda you ask? Complete and utter bulbacide. Ok, seriously… my plan?? My plan was to replace every incandescent light bulb in my entire house. This turned out to be more of a task then I could have ever imagined. There were so many wattages, sizes, shapes, and colors of CFL’s. I mean there was warm white, soft white, full spectrum, full spectrum daylight, halogen white, and many more that I can’t remember! Then there was Kelvin, do I want 2700 Kelvin, 3500 Kelvin, maybe 4100 Kelvin, wait, wait perhaps 6500 Kelvin!?  I had no idea what kind of compact florescent to buy to replace what incandescent bulb. All I knew was I had almost 50 bulbs to replace. (Click Read More to Continue)

The easiest way for me to accomplish this was to write down the size, location, and wattage of the current halogen bulbs. I then took my list down to a local hardware store and starting sizing up compact fluorescents. I was a bit overwhelmed by the amount of choices I had. There were in fact different wattages, brands, shapes, and prices. After about an hour I finally figured out what I ones I needed. It just took some serious box reading and comparing, even a bit of price comparing. At this point I returned home and started the bulb replacement effort. I found some were too bright, some were too big for the ceiling fans, and some were way to sterile looking when turned on. After playing musical bulbs, I finally completed my task. So, what were the results?

Not so fancy mathematical results:

100 Watt X 1 = 100 Watts
75 Watt X 5 = 375 Watts
60 Watt X 12 = 720 Watts
40 Watt X 14 = 560 Watts
25 Watt X 15 = 375 Watts
Total incandescent bulb wattage = 2130 Watts

11 Watt X 13 = 143 Watts
13 Watt X 18 = 234 Watts
7 Watt X 16 = 112 Watts
Total compact florescent bulb wattage = 489

A 1641 Watt difference!

I ended up paying $70.48 for the CFL army including sales tax. I also had a few spares to store away incase needed in the future

So here is the incandescent vs. CFL payback figuring 2 hours of use a day.
 
CFL will save 3.28 kWh per day and 98.40 kWh per month and 1197 kWh per year.  At an average of $.18 per kWh the lights will pay for themselves in under 4 months!  That means after the first year I will have paid for the new cfl’s and have an extra $141.68.  Not a bad investment in a bleak economy!

Now it’s time for the CFL regime to take over your home…. however…. the LED army approaches silently.

-Kynan Chambers
www.greenerbakersfield.com
www.greenbakersfield.com