Making Switch To LED Lighting A Way For Tulsans To 'Seriously Save Money'

More and more of us are switching to LED lighting, and now a historic Tulsa building is getting on board.

PSO is handing over a $134,000 rebate to the managers of the historic Sun Building in downtown Tulsa. They just replaced every light bulb on all 12 stories with energy-efficient LEDs.

"In property management, that's one of our biggest inefficiencies is lighting. And it has been for years. And until the advent of the new LEDs, there weren't a lot of alternatives to save a lot of money," said property manager, Kelly Baker.

Replacing the bulbs is time consuming and expensive, taking two months and about $500,000 to make the switch; but, it will lower their energy bill by about 60 percent.

Plus, since LEDs last much longer than traditional fluorescent bulbs, they'll hardly have any maintenance expenses.

The LED bulbs will end up saving the company almost $115,000 a year. And when the building owners save money, so do the tenants.

Baker said, "So they'll save immediately on their operating expenses, year to year, from here forward."

The project was led by Oklahoma LED. Company president Joe Schrader said their work has led to nearly $600,000 in PSO rebates for Tulsa companies.

And Schrader believes that number will grow.

"They're just going to get more efficient, and more efficient and more efficient. So the LED technology is here to stay," he said.

It's a way to seriously save money and shows that making the switch is a bright idea.

Schrader said the average household that switches to LEDs will lower its energy bill by about 65 percent.