Energy saving lighting can save you money in two ways. Firstly energy saving lamps/lamps have a much longer life than ordinary incandescent lamps. An incandescent lamp lasts approximately 1000 hours, Scotlight's mini-spiral lamps have a lamp life of about 10,000 hours! A longer lasting lamp means less money and time spent on replacing them, which is great for light fittings in hard to reach places. The second way energy saving lamps can save you money is on your electricity bill. Most incandescent lamps will have wattages of 40w, 60w and 100w while the energy saving equivalents run at much lower wattages of 11w, 15w and 20w. These lower wattages save a significant amount of energy over the lifetime of the lamp and help to cut down the cost of your electricty bill.

Where can I use energy saving lighting?
There are many different types of lamps which now have energy saving equivalents - Ordinary GLS lamps, candle lamps, golfball lamps, R60,R80 and GU10 spotlights. This means that most light lamps in your home can now be changed over to energy saving.

Will energy saving lamps fit in my light fittings?
Older energy saving lamps used to be much larger than ordinary GLS lamps and would stick out above the lampshade. The newer range of mini-spiral lamps are virtually the same size as GLS lamps and will fit comfortable into most light fittings.

Do they take a long time to "warm up"
Older energy saving lamps used to take a long time to reach their full light output. Scotlight's new range of energy saving lamps reach maximum light output in less than 30 seconds.

Is there any reason NOT to use energy saving lamps?
Yes. Energy saving lamps cannot be used with a dimmer switch. There are currently no energy saving lamps available on the UK market that can be dimmed using a standard domestic dimmer. However new breakthroughs in lighting technology are being made every day and it wont be long before dimmable low energy lighting is available for the domestic market.

For more advice or information on energy saving lighting for home and business, call us on 01896 830421, visit our showroom at 33 High Street, Innerleithen (directions available here) or visit our online lighting superstore.