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It has long been accepted that incandescent light bulbs are no longer the future of household lighting.

Attention is now shifting to their energy saving counterparts. But how do you know which type of energy efficient lighting is best suited to offer you effective light output, with maximum savings?

Compact Fluorescent Lighting (CFL) has been around for quite some time and really emerged as the first alternative to Incandescent lighting. They do offer significant energy savings, but also suffer from a number of well documented problems.

• The efficiency of CFL’s can be considerably reduced if they are switched on for only a number of minutes at a time, sometimes making them even less efficient than the bulbs they were bought to replace.
• They can also take time to “warm up” resulting in lacklustre light output until they do.
• Another issue with CFL bulbs is that they contain a small amount of Mercury. Should a bulb break it is important to make sure that they are disposed of quickly and correctly, as Mercury fumes can be harmful (especially to small children).

In comparison, LED’s come with next to no issues. They also use even less energy than the CFL’s and have an even longer life expectancy.

When it comes to comparing the two, LED Bulbs appear the more efficient light source, and come without any of the problems associated with Compact Fluorescent Lighting.