Solar power is an interesting piece of technology which is finding new exciting uses pretty much every day. One of the newest uses is incorporating it into LED Lights. These don't pollute the environment, not to mention you don't need to connect them to your houses electricity supply. LED solar lights make it easy to position the lights wherever you want without worrying about wiring.

The Solar Powered Option

Solar power is amazing it allows you to get as much power as you want pretty much anywhere, it's all from the sun. This does mean that the amount of energy you generate can vary depending on the weather, and time of day. If you purchase good quality solar power lights for your garden they will also have batteries in order to power them at night. Unless they have batteries there's no point using them and you should stick to hard wired light.

You need to choose a solar light which has big enough solar panels and battery to provide enough power to last throughout the night. By choosing carefully you can ensure that your lights will work even when it's cloudy. Until recently solar lighting was only suitable for use by people living along the equator due to the high amount of sunlight required. There have recently been several major improvements in solar lighting.

Technological Improvements

The first improvement is that they are providing more light than before. LEDs provide directional light. These lights are now useful to create ambient lighting and even task lighting. A 45 lumen LED light is equivalent to a 75 lumen incandescent bulb. These use less electricity and so reduce the amount of money you must pay to run your lighting.

Another improvement is that they are more efficient. There is no need to use resistors which means more of the power can be used for the purpose of lighting. LED's get 100% of the energy from the lights which makes good efficiency.

You can now program LED lights so that they can be directed into particular areas. You can also change the intensity of the light which makes it very easy to customize. By adjusting this you can reduce the size of the solar panels and also use smaller batteries.

LED lights can last for longer at cold temperatures. This means that they can work effectively in the winter without needing to change the bulb. Other forms of outdoor lighting lose efficiency at these temperatures. LED lights should last around 5 times as long as an incandescent light.