LED Holiday Lights Are Where It’s At!

In just a few days, your life would normally go like this…

You’ll wake up overly full from a huge Thanksgiving meal, manage to put on a pot of coffee and maybe snack on leftover turkey or potatoes. Then, you’ll realize you missed many of the black Friday shopping deals so then you will catch up by shopping online before saying to yourself, “Ugh, I have to put up the holiday lights. They’re such a mess, every year.”

But this year, life is different!

Instead of going to the shed to untangle the web of disheveled and semi-burnt out lights, you should take a trip to the local store and grab some strands of LED holiday lights. From the recent hype LEDs are receiving, you’ve probably heard they use significantly less energy than the mini/icicle lights - and they’re really bright. When you string up your favorite colored lights and your neighbors compliment you on your outstanding decorations, you’ll be sitting pretty. And you’ll know you’re saving money this year versus last year!

Wonder how much you’ll save? We created a calculator to break it down based on lighting type and hours per day that the lights stay on.

In 2009, if you used five 100-bulb strand icicle lights, five strands of the 25-bulb bigger lights, and four spotlights and you kept them all on from 4:30PM until 11:30PM, it would cost you around $34.68 for the month of December.

This year, you can choose to go all out and use a whopping 15 strands of the 100-bulb LED lights and kept them on from 4:30PM until 11:30PM, and it would only cost you a mere $1.76!! That’s 6 cents per day to have your house shine brighter than ever!

It would take you over 250 strands of the LED lights to equate to your extra spending in 2009! Now we are talking about a Griswold holiday season!

Are you a 10 ... or a 1?

You might have heard that Vice President Biden announced the new Home Energy Scoring Program. This new voluntary initiative offers homeowners a great way to check their homes energy efficiency, comparing their home's score to others in their region.

According to the press release:

“Under this voluntary program, trained and certified contractors will use a standardized assessment tool developed by DOE and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory to quickly evaluate a home and generate useful, actionable information for homeowners or prospective homebuyers. With only about 40 inputs required, the Home Energy Scoring Tool lets a contractor evaluate a home's energy assets, like its heating and cooling systems, insulation levels and more, in generally less than an hour. That means a homeowner can see how their home's systems score, regardless of whether a particular homeowner takes long or short showers or keeps their thermostat set high or low.”

The scoring system provides homeowners a 1-10 score, where a "10" is a home with excellent energy performance, and a "1" is a home that would benefit from energy upgrades. In addition to the score, the homeowner will receive a list of recommended energy efficient upgrades, and their estimated energy savings, payback periods and greenhouse gas emission reductions.

In cooperation with the Local Energy Alliance Program (LEAP), one of the pilot program testing locations is the Greater Charlottesville area. LEAP will conduct 400 home energy assessments for Charlottesville area residents as part of the pilot program. If you're local and interested in getting your Home Energy Score, contact LEAP for details.

Plasma, LCD, LED And Their Energy Consumption

It’s that time of the year where many people are searching for the perfect holiday gift. People might say they want a new pair of socks, a weed whacker, or a new vacuum…but we all know what they really want: a new High Definition TV!

With the holiday sales right around the corner, we wanted to share information to help you during your TV shopping and let you know about their power usage.

Today’s TV’s are more incredible than ever with 3D, built in sound systems, and other bells and whistles. But BE ALERT, LED, LCD, and Plasma TV’s aren’t all built the same.

Generally speaking, when it comes to how much energy HDTV’s consume, the average Plasma consumes 301 watts of energy; and the average LCD uses 111 watts, while the new LED TV’s consume around 101 watts while watching the season finale of The Biggest Loser.

While the initial sticker prices of many TV’s have come down to around $1,000 at the store, you should also consider how much it costs you each year in energy usage? If you purchase a TV that uses another $100 per year in electricity, the TV will cost you $2,000 over the next decade!

CNET has done a great job testing the top TV’s that are on the market and comparing them to each other in HDTV type, size, default settings of energy consumption, yearly cost, calibrated energy consumption and calibrated annual cost.

Here's the performance chart on CNET and don't forget to help others conserve energy and save money by sharing this page - especially those in the market for a new TV.

The Future is Bright for Kids and CFL’s

There is a new mentality when it comes to energy conservation and creating better habits - get them while they’re young! Just like with DARE and recycling, starting energy education early will lead to better habits down the road…and we all know kids nag their parents so the message is sure to spread.

A couple of weeks ago, in celebration of October’s Energy Awareness Month, Dominion set up a display of kid friendly activities at a local Lowe’s store in Richmond, VA. Activities included a coloring contest, a pedal generator, a lighting display and face painting.

The event promoted Dominion’s Lighting Program, where customers receive automatic discounts on CFLs at participating stores, and also educated kids on why conserving energy is important. We had a great turnout and will be holding similar events at other Lowe’s stores in Virginia:

• November 13, 2010 - 6750 Richmond Highway, Alexandria, VA
• November 20, 2010 - 45430 Dulles Crossing Plaza, Sterling, VA
• December 11, 2010 - 15150 Montanus Drive, Culpeper, VA
• December 18, 2010 - 300 Chatham Drive, Newport News, VA
• January 8, 2011 - 6659 George Washington Memorial Highway, Gloucester, VA
• January 22, 2011 - 9490 West Broad St., Richmond, VA
• February 5, 2011 - 1640 West Broad St., Richmond, VA