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Archived Posts For
Monday,
May
13th
2013
Monday, May 13th 2013
LED Floodlights Light Up the Night
In both landscaping and architecture, floodlights have been used to showcase homes and businesses for decades. Whether illuminating an entire building or one special tree, floodlights pick points of beauty out of the night. LED floodlights shed brilliant light on the landscape, yet use less power, generate less waste heat, and last far longer than traditional lights.
So much energy is saved by LED floodlights that more than twice as many floodlights can be installed while still cutting energy use in half. Most LED floodlights are 120-277 volts, just like conventional lights, except for drawing less power, and can easily be fit into existing landscape wiring. The best of these lights are UL Listed with 5 year warranties.
Another option exists in 12 volt or 24 volt floodlights. Low voltage lights offer some real advantages for outdoor use: low voltage cable doesn’t need to be buried as deeply, is less dangerous if accidentally cut, and power consumption is low enough to consider using a solar power system. The disadvantage is the need for a 12 (or 24) volt transformer which must be housed in a weatherproof location, and may wear out and need to be replaced before the LED’s.
The much lower energy costs and very long life of LED’s lead to a real savings over time, despite LED floodlights having a higher original purchase price. There is also the less obvious saving in labor. Instead of changing out bulbs every year or two (if you’re lucky), LED lights will not usually need to be changed for 7-10 years. The highest quality LED floodlights last 20 years running 12 hours a day.
LED floodlights are available in both replacement bulbs for existing features and new, dedicated LED fixtures. Replacement outdoor LED bulbs come in various sizes, light color and lumens (lighting power) to fit different floodlight fixtures and uses. New LED floodlight fixtures are available in many sizes, shapes, and colors to fit almost any décor; and they also come in a wide variety of lumen output from soft accent lights of 100 lumens to powerful 6,000 lumen building illuminators.
Most LED floodlights come in a choice light colors. The most common are “warm white” around 3000K (light color is often measured in degrees Kelvin, or K), similar to the color of an incandescent; and “daylight”, around 5000K with no golden hue. Daylight is more like what we have been used to seeing in a standard fluorescent tube. Other tones are available to suit a wide variety of applications.
As with all LED’s, LED floodlights do not contain toxic chemicals. Considering this absence of pollutants, their very long life, and low energy use, LED floodlights are by far the environmentally friendly of all floodlights.
Floodlights are a brilliant way (pun intended) to draw attention to the best and most important features of homes and businesses. Environmentally friendly, long lasting, cheap to run, the many advantages of LED floodlights make them the obvious and best choice for every landscaper, whether professional or DIY, to light up the night.
By: Mary Wecker
By Mary at 11:22:17 PM
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