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LED lighting continues to grow in popularity with UK households

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An estimated 14% of lighting appliances owned by UK households now utilise LEDs, a major step towards making homes more efficient. 

That’s according to AMA Research’s latest Lighting Market Report, which shows that the move towards the use of LEDs has steadily increased. In fact, LEDs now represent the majority of UK lamp sales. 

The move to LEDs is hardly surprising. Governments around the world have been steadily trying to phase out incandescent bulbs in favour of more energy efficient LEDs. The same is happening with halogen bulbs, which are also terribly inefficient when compared to LEDs. 

Not only are Governments actively working against incandescent bulbs, however, but LEDs have also become popular with retailers. IKEA pulled the plug on incandescent lighting back in 2011 and has gone all-in on LEDs, meaning anyone picking up an IKEA lamp is likely to use LED bulbs to power it. 

LEDs have numerous other benefits for consumers; they last longer, cost less to run, and their prices have come down steadily as the industry shifts towards LED lighting. LED lamps have also seen significant improvements in light output and quality in recent years, including a wider spectrum and warmer white light, helping to boost their acceptability in the market.

LEDs lead to greener homes

UK households may be opting for LEDs en-masse already, but the UK Government doesn’t think that the adoption goes far enough. That’s why LED lighting installations will be one of the energy efficiency upgrades homes can make under the Green Homes Grant scheme

Exact details surrounding the Green Homes Grant scheme have yet to be released by the Government, but it goes live in September, so we expect to hear more any day now. 

Covid-19 comes to rain on the LED parade

Unfortunately, while UK households have embraced LEDs, the interruption of construction activity and the broader economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic will lead to a sharp fall in the value of the UK lighting market in 2020. Beyond 2020, the prospects for the lighting market are difficult to evaluate as the speed of recovery remains uncertain. It is currently forecast that the market is expected to decline 16% in 2020, with a return to growth in 2021, increasing 12% between 2020 and 2024.

Fiona Watts, Editor of the Lighting Market Report, states, “The key driver for the lighting market is the rapid adoption of LED lighting in both the non-domestic and domestic construction sectors. The advent of LED lighting, and the retrofitting of higher priced LED products into conventional lighting, boosted market value significantly between 2015 and 2017 but a sharp fall in LED prices since then has led to a decline in market size in the last two years.”

The lighting market supply chain has become more fragmented with the advent of LEDs, with organisations from non-traditional lighting backgrounds, particularly those with a background in semi-conductor manufacture, entering the market. LED technology will likely become increasingly dominant in the lighting market and is expected to be used almost universally by 2024.

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