I WAS LISTENING TO NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO’S SCIENCE FRIDAY last week and I heard a guest mention the name Naomi Oreskes and her book with Erik Conway, “Merchants of Doubt.” The authors had studied the distraction tactics of the tobacco industry to cause uncertainty about the dangers of smoking and cancer. They found that the same techniques have been applied to the issue of climate change. In this age of nearly instant shopping, I downloaded “Merchants of Doubt” along with a newer title by the authors, “The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View from the Future.” As a futurist myself, I quickly read “Collapse,” and while it does indeed describe a gloomy future (starting in 2093), what I found useful was the projection of reactions showing governments either reacting in an adaptive way for their citizens and thereby lessening social, economic and environmental consequences, or letting their societies slide. I recommend both books to you. “Collapse” is a short and fast read.

The books got me thinking about a phrase I heard years ago from a colleague at Hewlett Packard. He was talking about the reason HP invested so heavily in continuing professional education and development for its engineers. He said it was in HP’s “enlightened self-interest” to offer, and indeed insist on, continuing education. Not only did HP’s engineers feel they were keeping pace with professional change by taking Stanford and other universities’ seminars, they were bringing those new concepts and developments back to the enterprise and the bottom line of the business.

I also liked the idea of enlightened self-interest as a way to think about taking actions leading to sustainability. As an individual with a more-than-50-year career, and one partially necessitated by economic realities, I like the idea of being concurrently sustainable and smart when it comes to my finances.

Light the lights

As fall is progressing and nights become longer — and as our holiday season is beginning — I like lighting up the night. I thought it would be interesting to see if there has been any progress in the LED lighting arena for inside the home and for holiday lighting.

See the chart below for current comparisons.

What I found in comparing bulbs is that the LED 100-watt-equivalent bulb has improved in its efficiency, now using 18W per hour of energy instead of the 22W from a year ago. All the prices of light bulbs have decreased and the price of electricity has increased.

I’ve mentioned that I’ve done a lot of energy upgrades in my home, and I can tell you that my spring 2014 home remodeling that involved indoor lighting quality has dramatically improved the look and feel of my kitchen and hallway, thanks to the addition of LED canisters to those areas. By looking at the numbers above, I see I could have five 100W-equivalent LED lights turned on for the cost of one 100W incandescent — or if I stretch it, almost two 100W equivalent CFLs.

I’m pleased to be saving money and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, while also lighting up those long fall and winter nights.

What about Christmas lights?

I found a commercial site (they are interested in selling Christmas lights) that compared incandescent Christmas lights to LED Christmas lights — and what I found is that the electricity cost savings are impressive. See below.

It’s nice to know that we can be both sustainable and light up our nights by reducing waste and cost.

Learn more

• christmaslightsetc.com/pages/how-much-power.htm

• collapseofwesternciv.org

• homedepot.com/shopping-tools/light-bulbs/bulbcomparison.html

• Naomi Oreskes: fas.harvard.edu/~hsdept/bios/oreskes.html

• rapidtables.com/calc/electric/watt-to-kwh-calculator.htm

Constance Beutel is the chair of Benicia’s Community Sustainability Commission. She is a university professor and videographer and holds a doctorate from the University of San Francisco.