1. The Truth Behind Light Bulbs!
By: Julie Adkins Period 5
Mr. Gorden

2. What I am Testing
Which light bulb, either a 60 watt CFL light bulb or a 60 watt Incandescent light bulb, will take up the most energy in two hours when measured by an electric energy meter lamp?

3. Why Light Bulbs?
I chose to do an experiment about light bulbs because you know all of those commercials you see about this type of light bulbs saving you more energy and then another type claiming to save more? Well, I want to find out which type of light bulb really does save you more energy! I want the truth!!!!

4. Hypothesis
If I measure the energy difference between a 60 watt CFL light bulb and a 60 watt Incandescent light bulb for 2 hours each using an electric energy meter lamp, then the 60 watt Incandescent bulb will have used the least amount of energy. (It would save more)

5. My Variables Independent-Type of light bulb tested
Dependent-Amount of energy taken up when measured by an electric energy measurer for 2 hour
Constants-Amount of time, Type of bulb, Amount of watts each bulb has.

6. Materials My Materials: 60 watt CFL 60 watt Incandescent
An electric energy meter lamp.

7. Procedure Gather Materials Set time to 1 hour
Select light bulb and place on energy meter lamp
Turn on measurer and start time at the same time
Wait 1 hour
Record how much energy was used
Repeat steps 2-6

8. Data Found
I found out that a CFL, when used for two hours, only used a total of .5 watts of energy.
An Incandescent, when used for two hours, uses a whopping 1,024.5 watts of energy.
The CFL saved 1,024 watts of energy, and the Incandescent wasted 1,024 watts of energy.

9. Conclusion
A 60 watt CFL uses less energy than a 60 watt Incandescent. For my experiment, I simply used a 60 watt CFL bulb for 2 hours on an energy meter lamp, recorded my data, and did the same with my 60 watt Incandescent bulb. I then took my data and subtracted the beginning meter number from it.( I recorded the beginning number of each before testing.)

10. Conclusion Part 2
I then took my data and subtracted the beginning meter number from it.( I recorded the beginning number of each before testing.)
A 60 watt CFL used .5 watts of energy when used for 2 hours and an Incandescent used 1,024.5 watts of energy when used for 2 hours.

11. Conclusion Part 3
My data doesn’t support my hypothesis because I said that the 60 watt Incandescent bulb would use less energy than the 60 watt CFL, but it actually used a lot more!
I learned that the CFL light bulbs are a better deal than the Incandescent light bulbs. They save you a lot more energy!

12. Conclusion Part 4
Not many errors occured, but I had to have a pretty long lesson on how to read the meter. I just couldn’t process it. (Until I did.)
If I could do anything differently, I would have made it harder on myself by maybe seeing which brand and type and wattage saved more money and energy. This one seemed a little easy, but proved difficult at the same time.