| Solid State Lighting Last 10 Times Longer Than CFLs with NO Harmful Mercury |
| | Solid-state lighting, or SSL, could be the next big thing in residential lighting. SSL refers to a type of bulb—or lamp, in industry parlance—that uses the movement of electrons through a semiconductor material to generate light. The semiconductor is in a solid block form, hence “solid state.” Because there’s no filament that heats up (and eventually burns out), SSL is up to 50 times more efficient than incandescent bulbs, claim manufacturers. SSL is also said to last as much as 10 times longer than compact fluorescent lighting and contains none of the potentially harmful mercury that has brought CFLs image down to earth and made recycling them a hassle.Read the full Consumer Report. article. |
| | 5/02/2008 7:36 PM (572d 11h 5m ago) |
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| Ceiling Fans... Which Directions Should The Blades Rotate? |
| | All of the ceiling fans recently tested by Consumer Reports run clockwise to blow air downward and have a switch that you flip to reverse the motion of the blade. During warm weather, you run the fan clockwise to create a breeze that cools you—that’s the wind-chill effect, the same cool breeze you feel when you roll down the window in a moving car.If you’re looking to lower your energy bills during cooling season, use ceiling fans and turn off your air conditioning or turn up the temperature on your A/C a few degrees and let the fan go to work. Remember that ceiling fans cool you and not the space you’re in, so turn them off when you leave the room for an extended time so as to not waste electricity. |
| | 6/06/2008 4:57 PM (537d 13h 44m ago) |
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