DWQA QuestionsCategory: Risk to HumanityA viewer asks: “Are LED light bulbs a greater risk to human health as we have been told and better to use incandescent bulbs? If they are a bigger problem, then why is that?”
Nicola Staff asked 2 years ago
The LED technology is embraced for a number of reasons. It is more cost efficient in terms of consumption of electricity, and those efficiencies have the strong blessing of the environmental movement. But none of that considers the potential health consequences of the kinds of energies being emanated. LEDs have a particular technology that radiates a harmful electromagnetic frequency band and that will impair health and longevity. It is analogous to what happens from AC current in general, coursing through the house wiring and every appliance used in the course of the day, and that is true of any kind of illumination derived originally from AC power that will cause electromagnetic frequency emanations regardless of the type of light bulbs in use. But the LEDs in particular will create a band of electromagnetic frequency of their own as a byproduct of the physics in generating luminance that is unhealthy, and that is what makes them different from incandescent lights. There are also differing effects on the body from the narrower spectrum of wavelength and in particular if the illumination is persisting for extended periods of time this can have adverse effects on vision. That is a lower level of risk for most individuals, but it would be unhealthy to live under LED light year-round without ever having a break. So this just gives you some idea of the fact you have a far from ideal technology that is grown in frequency of application, and is now ubiquitous in the marketplace and will be difficult to displace because of its perceived advantages.