In addition to the thirty second rule, we went through our house and replaced quite a few of our light bulbs with CFLs (compact fluorescents) ad some LED (light emitting diodes). We started with the exterior porch lights. This was because we leave our porch lights on all night for security. And, since we live in a house that sits on a corner, with three bollard lights, two porch lights and four “over the door” lights, we had some serious wattage going on.Originally, we had 60 watt bulbs in our three bollards, 100 watt bulbs in our two porch lights and 50 watt bulbs in our over the door lights. That was a total of 580 watts going all night!
Well, we changed out the 60s and 100s for 11 watt CFLs and the 50s for 3.7 watt LEDS. That dropped our wattage from 580 to just under 70 watts. Not only do they last longer, but they put out almost as much light (except for the LEDs — they’re quite a bit dimmer and they’re expen$ive!).
But they all work fine for security. And, based on this success, I’m going through the rest of the house and replacing bulbs where I can (we have a lot of recessed can incandescents on dimmers, so it’s slow going). I’ve started with closets and am working my way through the house.
Consider CFLs or LEDs where you can.