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How to use LED lighting in summer to save electricity
As summer approaches, so does the peak in electricity usage. If you're looking for a more energy-efficient and eco-friendly way to spend your summer, what can you do to slow down the meter? The power department staff is here to answer your questions about LED lighting and energy consumption.
**Question 1: How much does it cost to run LED lights all night?**
Mr. Li lives in a small house where the hallway leads to the bathroom. To make it easier to walk at night, he installed about 4 meters of LED strips on the ceiling—each with 60 LED beads. He's considering leaving them on all night, but his wife disagrees, arguing that even though LEDs are efficient, running them all night still consumes a noticeable amount of power.
**The power station maintenance team leader responded:**
Most LED strips available on the market use 5050 chip packaging, with each LED operating between 3.2V and 3.4V, consuming around 0.18W to 0.2W. A single meter of LED strip with 60 beads typically uses between 9W and 12W. So, Mr. Li’s 4-meter LED strip would consume up to 48W per hour. That’s slightly more than a regular fluorescent lamp. If left on for 10 hours (from 10 PM to 8 AM), it would use 0.48 kWh. At a rate of 0.288 yuan per kWh, that’s about 0.14 yuan per night—very minimal.
**Question 2: Should I turn off the fluorescent light to save energy?**
Miss Chen uses a 40W fluorescent lamp in her hallway. Since moving into an older home with poor lighting, she used to keep the lights on all night. However, after seeing her electricity bill, her mother-in-law suggested turning the lights off when she moves from the hallway to the kitchen. But she heard that fluorescent lamps use a lot of power when they start up, and frequent switching might not actually save energy. Is this true?
**The power station inspection team leader explained:**
Yes, when a fluorescent lamp starts, there is a brief surge of current—about 5 to 7 times higher than during normal operation. However, this surge only lasts a fraction of a second, and the energy consumed during this time is equivalent to just one millisecond of normal operation. It’s negligible.
In short, even though fluorescent lamps aren’t major power users, turning them off when not needed is more energy-efficient. According to a detailed experiment by the U.S. science show “MythBusters†in Season 26, Episode 4, turning off the lights saves energy unless you’re returning to the room within 1/3 of a second.
That said, too many frequent switches can reduce the lifespan of the bulb. For Miss Chen, using a 40W fluorescent lamp with an inductor ballast that consumes 5–8W, running it for 5 hours a night would result in about 0.24 kWh, costing roughly 0.13 yuan per night. Whether or not to turn it off depends on personal preference.