When Terry Dactyl first came into my life, I started leaving a light on for her all day because I wouldn’t be getting back until sometime in the evening. I was concerned about the cost of the electricity, and annoyed with how often the light bulbs needed to be replaced, so once compact fluorescent light-bulbs became affordable (and easy to find) I took the first opportunity to replace the bulb in the lamp next to her cage. (I think she’s been using the same bulb for four or five years now.)
Lately, I’ve been fascinated by the availability of blue-white LEDs. They use more electricity than the red or green ones, but they’re much more efficient than an incandescent or even a fluorescent bulb. Because they use so little electricity, I’ve been able to put a half-dozen or so solar-charged lights in my backyard and have them stay lit half the night. (With a conventional bulb, a solar-powered light barely stays lit long enough to be worthwhile.)
Along with the lights in the yard, I’ve also bought a flashlight that uses a single AA battery to provide the light of a conventional one that uses three D-cells and more recently, bought a kit to convert my trusty mini-maglight to use a long-life LED instead of an expensive and hard to find mini-bulb.
With the growing use of LEDs as a low-power alternative to more conventional lighting sources, I’ve been wondering for a while when they’d start selling them for use as main-stream lighting sources.
It appears that the day of the LED light-bulb isn’t very far off. A company called Lumileds has one now for about $60. That’s too expensive for me right now, but the prices are expected to drop to $20 or so over the next two years, and even cheaper after that.
This is really cool!