Exit signs are just not something you think about, but exit signs run continually…that’s 365 days a year, 24 hours per day or 8760 hours a year.
Jonesville UMC’s energy audit recommended a simple, but effective way to save energy and money: change their exit signs from regular light bulbs (2 – 25 watt bulbs per sign) to LEDs (1 watt each).
Jonesville had 20 exit signs throughout the church, so this simple change was equivalent to turning off 19-50 watt bulbs. The change was as simple as unscrewing the old bulb and screwing in the new and took all of 2 hours to do the entire church!
This one simple change has a big energy stewardship impact:
- fewer problems for people with asthma – prevents the emission of about 9 pounds of nitrogen oxide, the main ingredient in ozone or smog, which is especially harmful to people with asthma;
- less acid rain – prevents the emission of about 27 pounds of sulfur dioxide, which causes acid rain; and
- less mercury pollution – especially damaging to pregnant women and children
- prevents global warming – prevents the emission of about 7 tons of carbon dioxide, the principal global warming gas.
And this translates to an annual saving of $900 a year – this year and EVERY YEAR FROM NOW ON!
They’re also labor-saving: the LEDs have a lifetime of 100,000 hours…therefore the next change is in 2015.
The cost of the LEDs was $12 each or a total of $240. And as a result of taking action on this recommendation, NYSERDA reimbursed Jonesville for the entire $200 cost of the Energy Audit (the cost of which has since been reduced). This is just one of seven cost-effective measures identified by the Energy Audit.