Sustainability
Reducing my
Environmental
Impact
Halogen Downlights to LED's
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One evening I turned on the kitchen lights and noticed on the Smart metre that they seemed to be using around 600 Watts/ hour more than our standard energy usage. Not only were these Halogen lights costing a lot to run on a regular basis they were also using a lot of unnecesary energy.
Taking Action:
Once I realised how much energy these Halogen light bulbs were using I decided to take action and change these ceiling lights to LEDs. To do this I had to replace the entire fitting and remove the transformer. The halogen bulbs were 60 Watts and the new LED bulbs were approximately 3 Watts. To reduce my environmental impact I did try to use the old fittings but sadly I could not.
Installation
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It was quite an easy installation in general but I had to make sure that I had correctly isolated the kitchen lighting circuit before starting work. Otherwise this could have caused me to get electrocuted.
Result:
Overall, I am very happy with the transition from halogen lights to LEDs. Not only is this saving money it is also significantly reducing my environmental impact. Because this was so successful in the kitchen, my Dad had the confidence to let me change all the fitments in the bathroom and ensuite too. These rooms were slighly harder as I could not access the wiring without going into the loft. In total, I changed 18 lights and if these were all on and left on for an hour they would use just over 1kW.