What are the differences in the types of light bulbs used in the home?

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We've gotten used to the mushroom-shaped incandescent light bulb that's illuminated our homes for generations. But over the last decade, two new light bulb technologies have become more widely available--as well as more affordable--while offering significant energy use and cost savings.

• Incandescent: The most common light bulb, the one that you grew up with, incandescent bulbs are inexpensive and provide a variety of illumination levels (from 15 to 150 watts). However, incandescents are not very efficient, losing up to 95% of its energy as heat (with a 100-watt bulb heating up to around 300 degrees F).
  
• CFL (Compact Fluorescent): A type of fluorescent lamp, CFLs provide the same amount of visible light as incandescents, but they use less power (about 75% less) as well as produce less heat (also about 75%). While they're more expensive, they can last up to 10 times as long as an incandescent bulb and save you up to $40 of energy costs during their life.
  One downside, however, is that CFL bulbs contain a small amount of mercury, which requires extra steps for removing them from your home either after it burns out or if it breaks (see more below). Another frustration about some CFL bulbs is they tend to require a warm-up time of between 30 seconds and one minute before they reach their full brightness.
• LED (Light Emitting Diode): Even more efficient and longer lasting than incandescents and CFLs, LED lamps are the next step to reducing your energy consumption and saving money on your electric bill. You might be familiar with LED lights on electronics (such as a power button), but now lamp bulbs are able to take advantage of multiple illuminator LEDs inside a fixture to produce full spectrum color (i.e., white light). 
  LED bulbs can last up to 50,000 hours (about 8 times the life of a CFL bulb and about 15 times that of an incandescent bulb), and they produce far less heat than incandescents (like CFL bulbs). Unlike CFL bulbs, there's no warm-up time for the LED bulb to get to full brightness. And LED bulbs do not contain mercury, so there's no worry about disposal.