US To Extinguish (Most) Incandescent Bulb Sales By 2012

[wooferhound]

US To Extinguish (Most) Incandescent Bulb Sales By 2012 Joining Europe and Australia

http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/12/24/1316228

[wooferhound]

This change in the use of incandescent lighting is ebcause of the New Energy Bill that was just recently signed into law. Here is more news on that.

http://www.tcdailyplanet.net/?q=article/2007/12/21/energy-bill-brings-change-passes-renewable-electr
icity-standard.html

http://money.cnn.com/2005/07/29/pf/energy_bill_consumers/index.htm

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/12/23/18468576.php

[strider3700]

I'd guess 99% of lights can be switched over without any significant changes.  There are however some specialized areas where the old bulbs are necessary/superior.  I have a ceiling fan with a dimmer for the built in light that doesn't work with CF.  I hear that there are dimmable CF bulbs but I've never seen one in a store (and I do check regularly)  I also use older bulbs for space heating/light when I start my seedlings. I hear these bulbs will also go a long way towards keeping chickens happy in winter when I get some.

It's just sad that people have to have the laws changed to make them do the right thing.  In the vast majority of places CF bulbs have been economically the right choice for at least the last 3 years.  

[willib]

hey woof , while reading about the bill i came across Minnesota's wind energy plan

http://www.ilsr.org/columns/2006/021306.html

 interesting stuff

.

[laskey]

I think what's really important here is that they are going to have to completely re-design the easybake oven.

Merry Holidays,

Chris

[TomW]

Ouch.

[Hoskald]

The Big problem with this law is that the US is trading one environmental concern for another, possibly worse, in the future. While there were few users of CFL the mercury content was negligible and at the higher price point they were treated as equipment and not disposable items. Now that they will mandated, they will be treated as the current crop of light bulbs and just tossed. This will add a significant amount of free mercury in the landfills and thus into the environment. Frankly, I don't see this as a good thing.

There is a place for everything. I currently run about 90% CFL in my house, but there are other applications where the regular old incandescent  bulbs are the superior option. Night stand lights in the children's rooms are one.  They tend to knock over lamps on a semi-regular basis and I don't need exposure  to  mercury  added to the broken glass. And then there are places where the cost of a CFL isn't justified, for example, the hallway light that isn't on more than an hour a year.

Legislating common sense has never worked, never will.

[catweazle]

You may find they already have... ;-)

"The Easy-Bake Oven, currently a product of Hasbro, is a working toy oven that for many years used an ordinary light bulb as a heat source, but now has a true heating element." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easy-Bake_Oven)

[zeusmorg]

 Also, you will find that incandescents are superior where color temperature is important, such as in photography. I'm sure you've experienced green skinned people.

 It's a real problem to do color matching in a place where various types of fluorescent tubes are used..

[fungus]

Colour temperature depends on what you buy; you can get fluorescents in just about any temperature including the 'incandescent' temperature, just need to actually look.

[catweazle]

True. Better (C)FLs use fluo mixes that provide more natural colours. They're usually a bit more expensive than the cheap ones. But, FLs have a very discrete spectrum, whereas incandescents provide a nearly continuous spectrum.

Incandescents still have their use. For heating chickens, or in the bathroom (where the light is turned on for only a few seconds each time).

Incandescent vs. CFL; different horses for different courses. Too bad one horse will be banned from the USA (and Australia and Europe). But if the average person can't choose the right product for an application, maybe the choice needs to be made for him.

Remember, these are the same people that need warning labels that say 'unwrap candy bar before eating' and 'do not use microwave to dry wet pets'.

[BrianK]

So now I wonder what will happen when you open the fridge door with a cfl in it. All the cfls that i have ever used dont like real cold temps so I guess from 2012 on we will have to hold the fridge door open while the bulb warms up.

.

[wdyasq]

LEDs

Ron

[martin1]

or use a LED.

[martin1]

Ron, I guess we were thinking about the same thing at the same time.

[Volvo farmer]

We actually had a little 5w CFL in our old Servel. It lit every time we opened the door. 36F is actually not all that cold for a CFL, Maybe they wouldn't work too good in a freezer though.

[g reif]

there is a lot more mercury from coal put in the air from using an incandest bulb then the 4mg in a cfl.

[powerbuoy]

I believe that the fluorescents are only an intermittent solution (like the hybrids in the vehicle industry)

The LEDs are already knocking on the door. Pretty powerful and soon available at the right warmth and brightness.

[dalibor]

i also think the same

LED is the future.

i am not sure about just one thing - how much energy factory needs for making amount of leds equal to one "old fashioned" bulb?

similar debate was about toyota Prius - how really that car is "greener" then ordinary one -  if we include energy needed for making it from basic elements.

[2dumb2kwit]

 I've heard of a study, that showed if you figure the production of a car, the life of the car, and the disposal of the car, that a hummer is more eco-friendly than a prius. Can anyone shed some cf light on this?

[g reif]

this report was from a far right group, they used fuzzy math to get there numbers. An example they gave the hummer a lifespan of 379,000 miles and 35 years but the prius of only 109,000 miles and 12 years. I've owned GM products all my life and no way I would get that kind of life out of their trucks... cost me a mint repairing them the way it is.

they also did not figure in repairs as the prius is reported (by toyota) be in the very low cattagory for problems/repairs, I do not know about the hummer.

As for lifespan it is reported some of the early prius's are getting up on the high miles of over 200000 miles with the origanal batteries

just do a search for "prius hummer" and you will find alot

[Drawbar]

I gotta say, I am in the process of switching to 100% CFL's and I am 90% there. Currently I just have to switch some outdoor lights over to them. Right now these lights are not used that much so the cost savings will be nill. but still I wish the CFL haters would read the packaging first, buy the appropriate bulb for the application, and just be happy with them.

They come in different light outputs and as we found out, clear CFLs, and white light CFLS have their places and by getting them mixed up, you run into problems. Get them right and they are indeed a gift to mankind?

How? By saving the northeast from mercury. I know I know, CFL's have a TRACE of mercury in them, but did you know children and pregnant women are not supposed to eat the fresh water fish here because of mercury. That mercury comes from the coal fired plants in the midwest producing power. If everyone in the midwest switched to CFL's and just one or two coal plants could be shut down, we would save tons of mercury being driven into the air,and ultimately landing on Maine.

Currently Maine has several windfarms that are going up. Ordinarily I would think this was good, but the owners of these wind plants are from the midwest power producers. Windplants allow them to get green credits that keep them from installing smog devices on their coal fired powerplants. Yes we get renewable kilowatts, but there is no reduction in mercury. Its a catch 22. We need incentives to install large scale windplants, and increase the kw output of the grid, yet the mercury poising still comes with the prevailing wind. The only true way to stop this is via conservation. CFL's will allow this country to maintain its lifestyle and yet reduce consumption.

Also check for incentives to buy them. Currently Maine has a program called "Efficiency Maine and there is a website about the program. I think Mainers can get 50% of the cost of CFL bulbs for residents and even more for companies. The company I work for is expanding its lightning system and only has to pay for installation of these new lights. The material costs are paid by the Maine PUC. Check into it if you live in Maine. If not,see what your state has for a program. You might be surprised.

[jacobs]

They are very dim until they warm up in my garage lights and in my outdoor lights at 40 degrees. They generally take about 5 minutes and even longer when the temperature dips down to 0 dregees until they give off much light. Incandescent bulbs are still far superior in some applications. I'm stocking up on them while they are still available and cheap for those specialized applications.

[jacobs]

Sam Kazman, of the antiregulation Competitive Enterprise Institute, likes to cite the now legendary Great Light Bulb Exchange sponsored by a local power company in the tiny town of Traer, Iowa. Half the town's residents turned in their incandescents for free CFLs--and electricity consumption rose by 8 percent. The cost of burning electricity went down, and demand increased.

[jacobs]

Possibly the amount of plastic (oil) in most new cars. Don't know how much plastic is in a Hummer but probably much less than Prius.

[g reif]

http://www.cei.org/utils/printer.cfm?AID=4114

if you read his work he is biass and offers no reference of where the info came from.

did they do the exchange in spring and then there was more energy usage in summer? --air con....  

let him show proof?

[valterra]

Thank you, O Powerful Government, for forcing me to be what you think is a better person.  I will strictly follow your standards and only eat the less than the amount of insect wings in my candy bars that you mandate.

I will not eat animal fat, but your mandated healthier hydrogenated trans fatty acids.

I will not eat your hydrogenated trans fatty acids, and will now revert back to animal fat, because you are now banning Transfat.

I will only take government-approved drugs like Thalidomide, so my future babies can be born with mutated arms.

I will not take Thalidomide because it has been recalled.

I will take Thalidomide again because it has been approved again.

I will only eat the foods you recommend, following your food pyramid.

I will only eat the foods you recommend, using your NEW food pyramid.

I will only eat the COLORS of foods you recommend, now that the pyramid is gone.

I will exercise because my Body Mass Index is higher than you mandate.

I will refrain from exercise, as the increase in carbon dioxide output may cause the earth to get warmer.

I will not smoke because second-hand smoke endangers children.

I WILL smoke, so that the taxes I pay on cigarettes may fund health care for needy children.

I will not kill mosquitoes with DDT so that I might kill millions of people with Malaria to ensure that birds eggs have firm, solid shells.

I will mandate that developing nations only rely on Wind and Solar so that the African Nations full of poor brown folk - rich with oil and coal - may never come and eat at the same table in our global economy and threaten my way of life.

I will require the corporations in my own country to follow rigorous and expensive environmental policies and increase unemployment, but will ignore China's polution so that I won't have to pay too much for those children to manufacture gadgets for me.

I will screw those evil, polluting corporations by ensuring companies like General Electric billions of dollars in profit and incentives on newly mandated "eco" generaion of electricity.  After all, what's greener than the ole Dollar Bill?

I will follow the preaching of private-jet-flying over-consuming mansion-dwelling prophets who can predict the weather 50 years from now, because THIS TIME they're right.

I will fly in my celebrity friends to "Think Global, Act Local" conferences where we each take our own jet, and spend millions of dollars to import luxurious GLOBAL food from NON-local sources.

I will support whatever tax hikes are necessary to rid us of the plague of incandescent  bulbs.

I will support FURTHER tax hikes to attempt to clean the mercury from our water.

I clearly make too much money, so I will gladly give it to you.  You are so wise and efficient, O Frugal Steward!  Lest I forget, please take it from me with force!

THANK YOU, O Powerful Government!  

[valterra]

Sorry, Couldn't resist.  You guys are good folks here.  But seriously, the government should be concentrated on more important tasks than trying to mandate lifestyle changes.  Last time I checked, Carbon Dioxide hasn't crashed any airplanes into buildings.  And my brother isn't over in Afghanistan right now fighting the evil Incandescent Clansmen.

[g reif]

anyone see "wilsons war"  kind of looks like the US created the terrorists

[valterra]

The US?  I thought it was Israel... if you believe anything a terrorist says.

By the way...  EZ Bake ovens won't have light bulbs, but will have actual heating elements?  So resistive heating is okay, but God Forbid it should also emit photons.

[laskey]

They released an EZbake with a heating element last year, and had to recall it because kids were burning themselves.

[Projector]

My fridge has two CFLs in it, purpose made for the fridge.  They do all right, provide enough light to see everything when the door is opened.

I've also noticed that the newer CFLs do pretty good in the cold, but the older ones have problems.  I replaced the cannister CFLs I had in my kitchen (look like little spotlights) with regular ones, and they work great.  The ones made for the application took about 5 minutes to warm up, the newer coily ones I replaced them with light instantly and provide enough light that I unscrewed 3 of the 6 bulbs.  With the spotlights I needed all 6 to not get as much light as I have now.  

And, I've got a 100 watt equivalent CFL in my droplight in the garage.  When I was using incandescents I'd break 4-5 a day when working in the garage, and would constantly burn myself in tight quarters.  With the CFL, no burn problems, plenty of light except on the coldest days (when I don't work outside anyway) AND over the last 4 years I've only had to replace the bulb once, and that's with the droplight being dropped several times from waist to shoulder height.  With the incandescent, it would blow out if you just looked at it funny, forget about dropping it.

[DamonHD]

In the case of breaking a CFL (I think I have broken exactly one) then there is a minor hazard from the released vapour.

Leaving the scene (and ventilating) the scene of the crime for a while probably minimises the risk from that...

Considering that we played with liquid Mercury at school I cannot get that worked up about it, though ready-vapourised stuff is probably less clever.

Rgds

Damon