Home > Home Buying Advice > Home Lighting Going Green Article

Energy efficiency is the new mantra for the lighting industry

by Marc Grossman

Green-building home builders are turning to new energy- and cost-effective lighting products and designs. New technology such as compact fluorescent light bulbs draw dramatically less energy and last much longer than traditional incandescent bulbs. Green lighting products now fit every color, form, shape and style. Lighting and interior design firms also discuss decorative trends.

Energy-smart lighting and decorative styles are the "two different types of trends in residential lighting we are seeing," according to veteran interior designer Sharon Moore, principal at San Ramon-based Creative Design Group. Bay Area Home Builder magazine examines both trends.

Lighting accounts for 25 percent of the average homeowner's electric bill, according to the American Lighting Association. Many appliances in the home consume much more energy than lighting. Still, people associate energy use most directly with lighting because that is what they see.

Energy-smart lighting

"By building green, home builders are tuned into bringing to the attention of potential homebuyers that the industry is being environmentally conscious by using green products and helping to conserve energy," says Moore, founder and president of the award-winning firm specializing in design merchandising of model homes. The influence of green building is also carrying over into newhome lighting design and manufacturing.

Interior designers and lighting companies are "getting consumers and builders to buy into—and understand the savings incorporated with—new lighting trends," states Greg Thomas, president and owner of Thomas Lighting Co. Inc. of San Carlos. "The state of the lighting industry is that green building has hit lighting and lighting is going into the mainstream with energy saving" products and strategies, he adds.

Lighting firms and utility companies are helping new and existing homeowners transition from traditional incandescent light bulbs to compact fluorescent bulbs. The difference in energy savings and longterm cost efficiency is dramatic.

The typical incandescent bulb—Thomas Edison's original 19th Century invention—has a life expectancy, or operating time, of 1,000 hours or fewer. The standard compact fluorescent bulb lasts approximately 10,000 hours, 10 times longer. Even more significant, fluorescent bulbs use one-fifth the energy of their incandescent counterparts.

Fluorescents do not sacrifice lighting quality. In fact, modern fluorescents emit more light. A 75-watt incandescent bulb can be replaced with a 15-watt fluorescent with the fluorescent producing the same amount of light—and supplying a considerably longer life expectancy. For years, fluorescents "got a bad rap over their color rendition," explains Thomas, who has 35 years of business experience, 97 percent of which today involves new homes. "All of us were aware of the cool blue light produced by fluorescents in office buildings. In residential applications, color rendition had been poor" whether fluorescents illuminated bathrooms where women were applying makeup or for general purposes in the rest of the house.

"Since then, the lighting manufacturers have come up with much better color correctiveness—more natural-appearing light" from fluorescent bulbs, he adds. Incandescents consume more energy than any other type of light bulb. That means their operating costs are substantially higher. Still, "initial out-of-the-box costs" of incandescents are much less than fluorescents, Thomas notes. An incandescent bulb can be purchased for about 50 cents. The fluorescent bulb goes for roughly $4.

But since incandescents use significantly more energy, the rule of thumb "in giving advice is that if you need a 100-watt incandescent, look for a 15- to 22-watt fluorescent bulb," according to Alan Sulieman, technology manager for the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, or SMUD, the publicly run utility in the capital city.

Much of the home builders' preference for incandescents has been "cost driven," Thomas observes. The inexpensive incandescent bulbs' "initial out-of-the-box costs" are much less than fluorescents. Any new product when it comes out of the gate is more expensive until increased demand and improved technology lead to more competitive costing." As more people buy fluorescent bulbs and consumers are educated so they understand their lower costs over time and contributions to mitigating global warming, "costs will come down."

"There are a few manufacturers pushing forward" with the energy efficient alternatives, Thomas continues. "As demand keeps expanding, growing competition and supply will reduce prices."

The movement toward more energy-conscious lighting is being driven, in part, by California's pioneering Title 24 energy efficiency regulations, which first generated standards in 1978. They now require that all exterior and bathroom lighting in new housing construction feature fluorescent bulbs, relates Thomas. Occupancy sensors— triggered to turn the lights on when someone enters a room and timed to turn off after a period of time when there is no further motion—can also be adopted.

Frequently overlooked, dimmer switches permit consumers to reduce lighting when they don't need it, saving both energy use and light-bulb life. Reducing voltage by 10 percent through the use of dimmers doubles bulbs' operating life as well as saves energy and money.

"For residential development, the most cost-effective lighting is compact fluorescent lamps," affirms Sulieman, the chief technology expert at SMUD. Manufacturers "have made a lot of headway in design and performance. They come in all types of forms, shapes and wattages." Builders, designers and homeowners "can find something that fits every socket and lamp—table or canned—surface mount or back alley or garden fixture. Compact fluorescents are both the most energy efficient and affordable alternative." Fluorescent lighting can be found in more than 200 colors, from the warm white tones of incandescent light to cool white tones similar to natural daylight.

The most exciting innovation is LED lighting, for light-emitting diode, Thomas reports, "the lighting most typically used today." Motorists are familiar with LED lighting illuminating the dashboards of their cars. Now it is being incorporated into commercial and residential lighting designs. "That will have a major impact on energy savings," he declares.

LEDs, touted by one online pundit as the "real unsung heroes in the electronics world," perform dozens of tasks and are found in a wide variety of gadgets, from digital clocks and remote controls to watches and appliances. They are simply very small light bulbs that easily fit in electrical circuits. Yet, unlike incandescent light bulbs, there is no filament that can burn out. They also don't get particularly hot, providing light only through the movement of electrons in semiconductor material. Therefore, they will last for as long as ordinary transistors.

The residential application of LEDs, Thomas notes, is leading the change from typical recessed lighting using 65-watt incandescents to 15-watt bulbs offering "the same lumen—or light—output. So you get the same light output from a 15-watt LED bulb as from a 65-watt flood light."

"Eco-friendly fixtures for environmentally-conscious consumers" are also available, Thomas says. "Like LED lights, designers and manufacturers are finally providing product that is more cost effective and energy saving."

Utility companies such as SMUD in Sacramento and PG&E in the Bay Area offer educational programs, design tools, advice and support for energy efficient building and comfortable indoor environments. PG&E's Pacific Energy Center is on Howard Street in San Francisco. Lighting specialists at these centers are often available to help anyone from the public "go over measures, tactics and strategies to create a good, efficient and well-designed lighting system" that spotlight the latest in energy-savings techniques, Sulieman says.

Decorative styles

Moore and Thomas also provide some highlights of the latest in decorative trends in new homes.

Kitchens. "With kitchen islands becoming larger and more focal, single light pendants suspended from the ceiling on cables or chains have been popular for a while in both contemporary and traditional styles," Moore says. A different look can be achieved by "using two small chandeliers or several bowl pendants—upside down bowls suspended from a chain—over the island," she adds.

Alternatives to overhead lighting can be had with puck lights—small, very thin hand lights recessed under kitchen cabinets—or fluorescent tube lighting under and on top of cabinets. "A high-tech contemporary feel can be achieved with flexible track lighting on a cable or wire" hanging from the ceiling, Moore notes.

"Very popular today are decorative pendants over islands," Thomas concurs. "Now they're being offered in LED, which should make them even more popular."

Bathrooms. "The old Hollywood-style bulb light bar is being replaced with two decorative wall sconces on either side of a framed mirror or a decorative bar with multiple sconce lights attached," Moore reports.

"What's new are linear fluorescents, cost effective fluorescent lighting, typically mounted over the mirror," says Thomas. "The trend is going to cleaner and cost-effective linear fluorescent lighting fixtures. But the majority of consumers still prefer more traditional looking incandescents over the mirror." He believes choice depends to some degree on "age, [with] younger people liking a cleaner, very contemporary look and middle-aged or older people preferring more decorative traditional fixtures."

Bedrooms. "Nightstand lamps are being replaced with pendant lights, giving an urban look," according to Moore. Ceiling-mounted light fixtures and canned lights "give any bedroom more versatility," she says. "Add a fiber optic kit to a ceiling light fixture and you can give your child ‘twinkle stars' on the ceiling." Chandeliers in bedrooms and master baths "are coming back" as well, Moore points out.

Thomas says "the trend again is consumer driven, going from switched wall receptacles—such as plugging in a floor lamp—to homeowners preferring overhead lighting fixtures, a throwback to older homes from the '70s." Ceiling fans are still popular too, he offers.


For additional information about lighting trends in the home building industry visit the following Web sites for Creative Design Group and Thomas Lighting, respectively: www.smcdg.com and www.tlcbayarea.com. For PG&E's Pacific Energy Center, visit www.pge.com/pec.