Last week I introduced my plan to leave the electric grid, and today I took my first cost-saving step:  I bought new CFL bulbs. 

The other day I talked to a friend who has invested in some really creative alternative energy sources, and now I'm inspired to leave no stone unturned.  I've decided that instead of starting big with some elaborate system that might pay for itself in 8 to 20 years, I'm going to start with the low-hanging fruit.  After dismissing the idea of replacing perfectly good incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescents, I ran the numbers and realized that I had underestimated just how much of a savings they represent.

Armed with my Consumer Reports ratings for the best CFL bulbs, I headed to Home Depot since that's where the top rated bulb is sold.  While I had expected them to cost $1.50 each, they were on sale for only $1 each!  I was only minutes into my quest, and I had already reduced my payback time by 33%.  I'm off to a good start.

The reason I hadn't gone CFL already was that I was convinced that I don't use many lights.  By many people's standards, that may be true; but that's not the way I should have been looking at it.  I should have been considering its impact on MY total electricity usage regardless of how that compares to the average household.

I replaced 11 bulbs, even some that I rarely ever use.  I estimated the number of hours each day that I use each of them and multiplied that by the number of Watts saved with each new bulb.  Speaking of Watts, this might be a good time to mention just how much more energy efficient CFL bulbs are.  They use about 20% as much power while producing the same amount of light. 

But how much does a light bulb really cost you?  If a 60W bulb is on for 8 hours each day, at my power cost of $0.104 per kWh, the cost is $0.05 per day.  You're saying, big deal!  That's nothing.  But I bet you have more than one light bulb at home.  You can probably find more than 10 bulbs really quickly.  I bet even the smallest homes have more than 20 bulbs.  I'll be conservative and say you have 5 bulbs (that are used 8 hours a day), which means the cost is now $0.25 per day.  In a 30 day month, your light bulb power cost is $7.50.  With CFLs, the cost is only $1.50 meaning that you've saved $6 on your monthly power bill.  If you spent $5 on 5 bulbs, then your new bulbs paid for themselves in less than a month!  Paybacks don't get much quicker than that.

I've taken the first step toward being independent from the power grid.  I estimate that this quick and painless change has reduced my bill by 2%.  It's not much, but there's no one thing that will accomplish my goal.  What's next?  I've not completely given up on solar, but I'll pursue more of the easy stuff first.  Stay tuned!