Compact fluorescents:75% power savings

Brightened up the playroom and kitchen a bit today by replacing ~500W of incandescent bulbs in recessed ceiling fixtures with 7x23W (=~175W) CFs from Home Depot (about $4 each).  The “green” n:Vision bulbs have a pleasant, warm glow to them (the “blue” and “red” really would work only in the garage) and Annie agreed the situation was improved.

That’s a power reduction of about 70% for those two rooms.  For an optional source of additional brightness, I retrofitted a broken halogen torchiere lamp to take 2x25W CFs (equivalent light output to 150W incandescent).  Since the kitchen already had about ~150W of CFs lighting, that brings the total lighting demand for those most-used rooms in our home to 325-375W.