Free LED lamp replacement for life Free LED lamp replacement for life - news feed from the Electrical News Portal

As a broad national average, lighting makes up around 10 to 15 per cent of electricity bills. Two entrepreneurs have joined forces to launch a new super-energy-saving LED light bulb that is claimed to save money, save time and save the environment. The new lamps are 90 per cent more energy efficient than their halogen counterparts and outlive traditional halogens by 48,000 hours each. The LED light not only boasts energy saving value but also comes with a ‘for life’ certificate so consumers will only make the purchase once, with free replacement for life.

Founder of Gloucester company Epsilon Test Services, Mark Blanchfield, has joined local celebrity, Tim Bawtree, who shot to fame with his underground eco house in Channel Four’s Grand Designs. Together the directors have formed www.bulbs4life.com to supply the best in LED bulbs (or ‘lamps’ as they’re known in the trade), which they say perform as well as halogens but use just 3-5 watts of electricity to produce the same light output as a halogen lamp.

The ‘for life’ aspect of Bulbs4Life products is a scheme for replacement and refurbishment, run by the company. When consumers buy a lamp they will automatically receive a certificate that guarantees replacement for life, made possible by the quality of the lamps, say Bulbs4Life. Once their LED stops working they simply return it and receive an immediate free replacement; their lamp is refurbished and then reused. Businesses are offered a similar scheme where their lamps are refurbished at a minimal cost, with over 70 per cent of the components being recyclable.

An average household replacing ten halogen lights for Bulbs4Life LED equivalents could save £1700 and 5700kg of carbon savings over a ten year period. For businesses and organisations the savings are even greater, given their higher usage: An example organisation replacing 1000 halogen lamps for these LEDs would save 92 per cent on their energy bills*, cutting from £12,000 spent annually on electricity to power them to just £1,000; an impressive potential saving of £11,000. In this example, the money saving is enhanced by carbon output savings of 41 metric tons per year.

“Our LED lamps emit light of the same quality as halogen bulbs, they do not flicker and switch on instantly, so there is no compromise in performance when switching to LEDs,” explained Bulbs4Life director, Mark Blanchfield. “As our LED’s last so much longer they also reduce ongoing maintenance costs associated with replacement and more than 70 per cent of our lamps’ components can be recycled. Landfill impact can be greatly reduced by refurbishment and harmful chemicals such as mercury are completely avoided with our LED lamps.”

Bulbs4Life are on the Carbon Trust suppliers list, which offers interest-free loans to qualifying organisations that switch to its LED lamps. The cost of purchase is covered for any business with up to 250 employees and replacing 200 or more halogen lamps. According to Bulbs4Life payback is swift, given that loan repayments on the purchase price can be easily covered by financial savings on energy in just nine months, fitting well within the typical loan term of three to four years.

Commenting on the scale of the environmental potential, Tim Bawtree said, “Our hope is that consumers, companies and organisations will swap their electricity-thirsty halogens for energy saving LEDs and nationally this could go a long way to fulfilling the Government’s targets for CO2 savings (Carbon Emission Reduction Target or CERT). For example, if every home replaced just one bulb it would save 36 million tons of CO2 in a year; that’s 80 per cent of the Government target in 2010 met in just one step.”

Local Liberal Democrat MP and Shadow Environment Minister, Martin Horwood, is positive about the new lighting: “This is, literally, a brilliant product from a great local company. And it’s good for the environment too. I’ve done my best to support Bulbs4Life and I want to see one of Cheltenham’s green stars succeed. For customers it offers a clean, green conscience and big savings on the bottom line,” he said.

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