Use 70 percent less energy and your electric bill will seem like a gift from the utility company. BY THE HOME ECONOMIST 

This holiday season, give less money to your power company and instead give more presents to your family by owning the kind of decrotive light strings wearing the “Energy Star” label. They use 70 percent less electricity and lower your electric bills bigtime. Not only are you left with more dough in your pocket but there are other perks to these little lights.

They are cool to the touch, which is good for those of us with lhands and mouths that may either toddle around the tree or rip them off to hurl across the room at unnamed sisters.  They also last ten times longer than the traditional variety and are more durable and shock resistant, according to the Energy Department. Those labeled okay for outdoors have been weather tested and some even come with features such as dimming or color-changing.

Choose decrotive lights with this label and you’ll use 70 percent less electricty. Save power means lower bills.

How do you find them? All the typical brand names sell an Energy Star variety – including CVS, Costco, Ace, Dollar General, December Home and so many more – but you have to buy the packages with the label (shown right.)

FAST FACT: If all of us used energy-saving holiday lights to decorate our homes we’d reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of 100,000 cars (that’s 700 million killowatts of elecricity, for anyone keeping count.)