Residential Lighting

In the average U.S. home, lighting accounts for about 20 percent of the electric bill. The easiest way to start saving energy is to change out the light bulbs in your current fixtures for more energy efficient ones. A high-quality compact fluorescent light bulb (CFL) will save about $30 over its lifetime and pay for itself in about 6 months. It uses 75 percent less energy and lasts about 10 times longer than an incandescent bulb. Nationwide, the energy savings potential is significant. According to the U.S. government's ENERGY START program, if every U.S. home replaced just one incandescent bulb with an ENERGY STAR qualified bulb, enough energy would be saved to light more than 3 million homes for a year and reduce energy costs by $600 million.

Because these lamps contain a small amount of mercury, they should be recycled. To learn more about energy efficient lighting, products used in homes, their mercury content, laws governing their disposal and how you can recycle, please explore this site.