Selecting A Closet Light: Safety Considerations

If you're looking to buy a closet light, it’s important to choose a one carefully as some lights can be fire hazards.  Here’s some things to know so you can chose the safest closet light.

Safety First

Closets typically contain lots of flammable materials and certain lighting might get hot enough to burn those things. Standard incandescent light bulbs are an example of hazardous closet lightng since these are typically bare, without a cover to temper the heat.

Any lighting that you use in your closet needs to be covered. If you have incandescent light bulbs, your safest option is to replace it with a different kind of light fixture. 

Light fixtures should be at least 18 inches from the sides and rear of the closet. You need to increase that length if your light fixture isn’t recessed to 24 inches.

Fluorescent Lighting

Newly built or remodeled homes use fluorescent bulbs. These incandescent lights don’t get dangerously hot. This is the easiest change to make, if you don’t want to replace your fixtures. You can just go to any store and purchase compact fluorescent bulbs. These are very popular not only because they produce a lot less heat, but because they use a lot less energy. This makes them better for the environment while saving you money on your energy bill.

Do It Yourself Light Fixtures

If you have a standard closet without a light fixture, there are a few things you can do easily and cheaply on your own. 

There are many kinds of battery-operated lights now that you can simply attach to your closet wall. You can even get motion-activated ones. The drawback to these is that batteries run down fairly quickly. But the technology that makes them gets better every year. For example, there are now lights that turn themselves off after a certain amount of time. That will save you money on batteries. These lights aren’t very bright, so they are nice to put in to a smaller space like a hall closet. They are also very inexpensive easily installed. You can use more than one in each space if you want.

Replacing The Fixture

If you want to go ahead and put a new light fixture in your closet, you'll most likely need to hire an electrician. The electircian will actually have to run wiring from a circuit that is already in the room. The electrician will run this from the circuit, to the switch, to the fixture.