Eco-Friendly Flat Screens

Though Black Friday (next day after Thanksgiving) in the United States has concluded, that doesn’t mean that the holiday shopping season is nearly finished. Though the mark-downs may not be as impressive, there is still a cornucopia of goods to buy as presents for both others and one’s self. Due to poor economic conditions, it seems wise that one should buy presents that will last well into the future, and prove their use and value over time. For the financially concerned and eco-conscious person, there are more gifts available than ever before.

Owning a television is as common as using some form of transportation to get to and from work, nearly everyone has a television set. This year though, there is a change in the LCD/Plasma TV market, one that is both eco-friendly and has the shoppers’ wallet in mind. Many TV manufacturers including the Japanese firms like Panasonic, Sony, as well as others from around the globe have begun to produce a new wave of more economically and environmentally viable television sets.
While the components that go into making these new brand of TV’s, dubbed “eco-TVs”, may not be ideal, the amount of energy that is spent by them has been significantly reduced. For those who still own a cathode ray tube television, it is understood that it can be used as a heating device during cold winter months due to the amount of electricity that is required to operate the box. The same was true with plasma and LCD televisions, but that is quickly becoming a thing of the past. Due to innovation paired with common sense, some technology driven, the price of operating a TV will become significantly less.

Some of the new features in these power saving TV’s include more efficient backlighting, to cut down on electric operational costs. While other tweaks involve including a motion sensor in the television, which will only turn it on when movement is detected. For those who sleep with the TV on, this has the potential to save large amounts of coin on the electric bill. One of the big steps forward has been to reduce the amount of heat that a television produces. Using less power has allowed newer TVs to run cooler, so cool that there is no discernible difference from touching the front and rear of the set.

Eco-TVs are seen as the next big step in private entertainment, and many companies are beginning to focus on cutting costs of operating their sets. These sets include the Viera V series plasma set by Panasonic, which uses nearly half as much as what the previous set in the series produced. The Aquos series of TVs which are made by Sharp use less energy and are cheaper to run than their predecessors. Sony has also begun to set up production of eco-TVs, with their Bravia VE5 series of televisions, which use close to 40% less energy than traditional LCD TVs.

As the Eco-TV market is heating up, the TVs themselves are cooling down. Only time will tell what is to be the next advancement in television technology.