LED (Light Emitting Diode) lighting is gaining popularity in the home as lighting manufacturers continue to introduce new and innovative products. LED lighting is ideal for task and accent areas as well as for back lighting applications. LED lighting is frequently used in the home in applications such as under cabinets, in alcoves, and even for step lighting. Besides its useful applications LED lighting is extremely lower power, making it an ideal candidate for green home building. For example, a 9 LED strip light only requires 1 watt of power.

If you’re considering building a green home, or just looking for a fresh new lighting alternative for your existing home, LED lighting may be your answer.

There are a number of LED lighting products on the market today, including strip lighting, floor and desk lighting, recessed lighting, standard incandescent bulb replacement lighting and night lighting. LED lighting products are also offered in a number of colors including white, red and blue.

LED Strip Lighting

A number of lighting manufacturers offer LED strip lighting solutions. For example, Sylvania offers 9 or 22 LED lighting strips. Each lighting strip contains either 9 or 22 LEDs, and is 10.8” or 20.5” inches in length, respectively. In addition, the lighting strips can be cascaded together to create longer strips. They run off of 120Vs, and depending on the size and LED color, they only consume 1.0 to 2.1 watts of power. LED strip lighting is ideal for under cabinets and counters for task and work lighting. They can also be used for display and general lighting applications.

LED Lamp Lighting LED’s are ideal for work applications. Consequently LED lighting solutions include contemporary floor and desk lamp lighting. LED lamp lights are extremely energy efficient with most solutions requiring less than 5 watts of power. As a result they are cool to the touch, thus eliminating a safety issue in the home. In addition, with long life times (10,000+ hours), LED lamp lights are maintenance free. There is never a need for a replacement bulb.

LED Lighting as an Incandescent Replacement

LED lighting solutions exist for incandescent replacements, however up until recently they have had limited home applications. LED incandescent replacements usually consist of a cluster array of LEDs and have extremely long life cycles, e.g. 40,000s hours. They are also shock resistant, come in multiple colors, and have limited fields of view (radiate light in less than a 360^o view). Because of their traditional high costs, but long life cycles, they have been relegated to mostly commercial, government regulated (24 hrs/day lighting requirements), and hard/expensive to replace applications.  This said, new LED incandescent replacement bulb technology is making inroads into solving the price and field of view issues. As a result, LED incandescent replacements are now beginning to show up in the home.

Recessed and Night Light LED Lighting

LED lighting technology is also being integrated into the green home via recessed lighting fixtures and night lighting solutions. Again, as with the other LED lighting products, they are extremely low powered and are ideal for spot applications.

LED lighting technology is an ideal solution for the green home, as it uses a fraction of the energy of both incandescent and halogen lighting solutions.  In addition, LED lighting solutions exist for almost every application within the home. Though the up front cost of LED lighting is high, it continues to drop and the monthly energy cost savings are dramatic. If you are considering building a green home, or just remodeling your existing one, visit your local lighting center first to check out this technology.