LED Light Bulbs - Why Make The Switch?

CFL's, compact fluorescent light bulbs, have been available (and affordable) for well over 10 years now.  Why would you switch to the newer LED technology, which is still more expensive?  LED's offer several compelling advantages:

• (Even) More Energy Efficient - CFL's are more energy efficient than incandescents, but LED's improve on the efficiency further.  A CFL 60W equivalent typically uses around 16-17 watts, whereas an LED 60W equivalent uses only 9.5-11W.
• Longer Lifespan - CFL's have a lifespan of 6,000 to 15,000 hours, about 0.7-1.7 years if the bulb were on continuously.  Contrast with only 750-1,000 hours for a typical incandescent.  LED's further improve on this: their lifespan is estimated at around 25,000 to 50,000 hours, but they have the added advantage that instead of burning out or breaking, they usually just become a little dimmer.
• Instant On - CFL's have a "warm up" period: when first turned on, they are a little dim, and it takes a few minutes for them to reach full brightness.  LED's come on instantly at full brightness.
• Mercury Free - Mercury is highly toxic and can be a safety concern, as well as a broader environmental concern when bulbs are disposed.  Most CFL's contain significant amounts of mercury, whereas LED's do not.
• Better Light Quality - CFL's never seemed to quite get to where they looked as good as old-fashioned incandescent bulbs, but LED's, simply put, do.  LED's even offer a few improvements in dimmers, offering unchanging light color at low levels.

In summary, LED's are better on all counts...in my opinion, now that the price has come down, there is little reason to not buy them for all new lighting purchases.  You may even wish to replace some of the CFL bulbs that are still in use.

If you switch from a 60W incandescent bulb to the 9.5W Cree bulbs listed below (currently the best price on the market) you will save 50.5 watts per bulb.  This means that if you use the bulb an average of 1 hour a day, you'll save about 18.4 kWh.  Typical electricity prices are around 10 cents per kWh, so at this price, you'll save $1.84 a year.  But for a bulb that gets heavy use, like 3 hours a day, you'll save closer to $5.53.  The bulb will pay for itself in a year!

If you switch from an already-efficient CFL, the savings will be more modest.  For example, switching from a 13-watt CFL to a 9.5-watt LED bulb will only save 3.5 watts, which, for an hour a day and electricity at 10 cents / kWh, will amount to savings of only about 13 cents.  But for a bulb that is on for a longer period of time, like one in an office or public building, used for 10 hours a day, the savings would amount to $1.28 a year.  For a $5 bulb (Cree bulbs are available in some regions as low as $5, everywhere for $10), this represents a ROI (return-on-investment) of over 25%!  This is a huge ROI.

LED's are so efficient that they represent a high return-on-investment even on bulbs that you only use for a few hours a day, and for more heavily-used bulbs, even when replacing energy-efficient CFL bulbs.

Unlike incandescent bulbs, LED bulbs are not necessarily dimmable.  Furthermore, some manufacturers will make claims of the bulbs being "dimmable", even if they do not necessarily behave gracefully in dimmers.  The good news, however, is that there are better options for using LED bulbs in dimmers than using CFL (Compact Fluorescents), which pair notoriously poorly with dimmers.

If you plan on ordering LED bulbs for a dimmer, I recommend not going with the cheapest (Cree) bulbs, but spending a little more money for the Philips 11 watt bulbs.  I've tested these in dimmers, and they behave much better.  The Cree bulbs claim to be dimmable, but they buzz and flicker, and cannot be dimmed as low.

If you install a bunch of Philips bulbs on the same dimming circuit, they sometimes flicker (or come on full brightness) if you turn them on on the lowest setting.  This is easily remedied by ramping the dimmer up for a few seconds, then dimming it again.

An Advantage of LED's in dimmers: People may be surprised to learn that there is one way in which LED bulbs outperform incandescents in dimmers.  This is the fact that they retain the same light color and quality as they are dimmed.  Incandescent bulbs, when dimmed lower, become more orange and then reddish at the lowest levels.  This can be problematic if you are trying to do anything involving color at low lighting levels.  LED's solve this problem beautifully.

Just like regular bulbs, if you put a normal LED light bulb in a 3-way lamp, it'll work fine, but you'll only be able to use it in two states: on or off.  To benefit from all three states for the bulb, you'll need to buy a special bulb.

Unfortunately, 3-way LED bulbs haven't come down in price as much as the regular bulbs have.  Expect to pay a little over $20 a bulb if you want this functionality.  Is it worth it?  You decide.  I bought two bulbs, mainly out of curiosity, and because I want to support the manufacturers of these bulbs out of principle, to create the sort of market demand that will eventually drive the price down.

If you'd like, the two bulbs that I would recommend (which were the most reasonable I could find on the market currently) are featured below.