How to choose a suitable light bulb?

When shopping for lighting, you can now use the Lighting Facts label and lumens to compare bulbs and purchase a bulb with the amount of brightness you want.

The Lighting Facts Label

The Federal Trade Commission requires the Lighting Facts label on all light bulb packages to help consumers easily compare energy-efficient bulbs.  The label includes:

Brightness, measured in lumens

Estimated yearly energy cost (similar to the EnergyGuide label)

Lifespan

Light appearance (from warm to cool)

Light appearance, measured by correlated color temperature (CCT) on the Kelvin (K) scale, from warm to cool.

Like the helpful nutrition label on food products, the Lighting Facts label helps you to understand exactly what you are buying and to buy the lightbulbs that are right for you.

 

Lumens: A New Way to Shop for Light

 In the past, we bought lightbulbs based on how much energy, or watts, they use. Wouldn't it make more sense to buy lights based on how much light they provide?

When you're shopping for lightbulbs, you can choose your next lightbulb for the brightness you want by comparing lumens instead of watts. A lumen is a measure of the amount of brightness of a lightbulb -- the higher the number of lumens, the brighter the lightbulb.

If you're replacing an inefficient 100W bulb, look for an energy-saving bulb that puts out about 1600 lumens. To replac a 60W equivalent, look for a bulb with about 800 lumens.

So when you're looking for a new bulb, look for lumens -- or how bright the bulb is. Now that's a pretty bright idea!