End of the Lightbulb??!!,....Edison, say it ain't so!

[Ecuador Jim]

So much coal, wow. I heard in a talk that as oil prices rise there will be even more of a switch to coal, it's good to hear that it's not too polluting.

While is may be getting cleaner, it's no panacea. Coal combustion releases more nuclear material (specifically Thorium 232 and Uranium 235) than is permitted for nuclear generating plants.

Until we find a sustainable method for generating energy, we're just trading one problem for another.

 

[dhermann1]

Mythbusters did a piece on the issue of turning off the light when ever you leave a room. The myth is that when the light goes on you use up so much energy getting the bulb warm that you might as well leave it on if you're out if the room less than 10 or 15 minutes. They found that the amount of energy used heating up a light bulb is equivalent to only a couple seconds regular burning, so basically, you'll save energy if you turn the light off every time you leave the room. Now I don't know what this will do to the life expectancy of the bulb itself . . . .

 

[Flivver]

A Potential Danger With Compact Fluorescents

I'm wondering if anyone else has had this same experience?

Several years back, my local power company handed out coupons with which to buy compact fluorescent bulbs at a huge discount. So I decided to give them a try in several frequently used sockets. Everything seemed fine for the first couple of years...until the electronics in one of the bulbs malfunctioned, causing the plastic base of the bulb to heat to the melting point. The bulb started flashing off and on at this point, alerting me to the problem.

But had I not been home at the time...who knows what would have happened!

I'm all for saving energy, but I'm not willing to risk a house fire to do so.

So I think I'll lay in a supply of incandescent bulbs until a more reliable form of energy saving bulb comes along.

 

[Ada Veen]

Mythbusters did a piece on the issue of turning off the light when ever you leave a room. The myth is that when the light goes on you use up so much energy getting the bulb warm that you might as well leave it on if you're out if the room less than 10 or 15 minutes. They found that the amount of energy used heating up a light bulb is equivalent to only a couple seconds regular burning, so basically, you'll save energy if you turn the light off every time you leave the room. Now I don't know what this will do to the life expectancy of the bulb itself . . . .

I think it depends on the kind of light, flourescents use loads and normal not so much. That's just what my father in law says though, so its not an official source!

 

[Ada Veen]

I think maybe the problem with switching to coal is a sustainability one. Pollution aside, fossil fuels are a non-renewable resource, so we have to think about future generations access to resources. I think a combination of different types of power generation is best, and (my econ lecturer's favourite word!) efficiency - getting as much power as we can out of as little coal as we can so we save some for future generations. Also with as little pollution as possible, of course. Energy efficiency engineering could be a very lucrative business, I reckon.

 

[Twitch]

Flourscent bulbs are cold and unflattering. They are actually poor to read in and distort peoples' looks. I may use a very few in the house in places where I rarely am but I prefer the incandescents' warmth. If and when they can create that in flourscent fine. Till then I'll stick with "old tyme" bulbs.

And of course the problem of disposal of toxic, dead flourscent bulbs hasn't been adequately addressed either. Is it another class of trash we'll have to keep segregated until we have enough to take to a specific disposal site like old electronics to make a trip economical?

If we had not listened to the green weeinies after 3 Mile Island we would have 30 more years of experience in nuclear facility construction design and safety. And since the NIMBYs have fought ANY type fueled powerplants and refineries we're swept up in thinking screwing in one bulb is going to free us all.

 

[dhermann1]

I believe we have several hundred years worth of coal left, even at expanding use rates. I would suspect that fusion, or some other technology, will be well established long before that.

 

[J. M. Stovall]

This is all we need:

 

[scotrace]

I once attended a conference at which a congressman from an area saturated in a huge supply of natural gas droned on for an hour about his planned legislation to kill off the use of coal for electric generation in favor of clean, efficient natural gas.
Of course, he was in a room full of power plant men from PA, WV and Ohio who were having none of it.

Generation of electricity now comes from various sources, and each one has its own economic and environmental flaws. The deregulation of the industry has, as many predicted, made the situation worse. As has the banning of any new generation plants in CA, and the halting of development of nuclear power plants. Demand increases every day, and it's not a genie that will go back into the bottle. How many new chargeable gadgets will you get/give next week? Every American house is full of energy-consuming devices that did not exist twenty years ago, when we all but stopped building new electric generation facilities. I'd be stunned if any US citizen here (can't speak for other nations) isn't shocked every time they open their electric bill.
Coal costs are astronomical. In January of 2005, coal cost approximately $29 per ton. In December 2005, it was approximately $37.50 per ton.
In December 2006, the price paid was approximately $44 per ton. It's currently running around $59 per ton. Your electric utility spreads that cost over its customer base in a "fuel adjustment charge" of some sort.

It's a complex issue, made worse than it had to be.

I'm putting stock in my wife's plan: Build a house off the grid and become completely self-sufficient.

 

[Badluck Brody]

Discount bulbs..

I figure I'll buy a bunch just for props and such...

 

[Luddite]

What strikes me about these 'energy conserving' lightbulbs is the amount of resource that is taken to make one. The incandescent comprises glass bulb, brass ferrule, ceramic potting, tungsten filament and not a lot else. The energy saving ones have plastic mouldings, componentry (ballast / starter capacitor and discretes soldered to a PCB), moulded glass tube with endcaps, fittings and interior coating of mercury compounds.

It worries me that we only ever consider the energy saving to us. Surely assembling such a complex product takes more energy than the bulb saves compared to incandescent? Or do we choose to ignore that because it has no direct bearing on our country's emissions? Also worth considering is the increased transport weight of a consignment of bulbs, and the disposal of the large amounts of waste mercury which will be generated by the disposal of these lightbulbs (not to mention the piles of unrecyclable, non bio-degradeable components and plastics used in the construction of these bulbs).

As a secondary factor, there's the usage issues. They provide a harsh light which is not easy on the eyeballs, they take a while to warm up, during which period the room remains in semi-darkness, and looking back to my school physics lessons, they consume 15 minutes worth of energy in startup - incandescents are close to max efficiency from hitting the switch - so just turning on the light to find your slippers in the shoe closet will consume more power with one of these compared to an incandescent.

I'll wait for LEDs before changing, thanks!

Another small point, some dimmer switches will use as much power dimming the lamp as when the lamp is at full brightness, make sure you have the new type ones - if they get warm when in use, ditch them and buy new ones.

 

[scotrace]

Excellent points!

There's a single CF lamp at my house, which has been in steady use since 1993, when it cost about $15. They are much cheaper now, but for the lousy cold light if gives, and still being years away from any kind of payback in efficiency, it still makes more sense to go buy a 10 Cent bulb.

 

[Twitch]

See that's what it all comes down to. What's it going to cost and who is going to pay? Has nothing to do with what is possible or implausible. Every aspect of fuel for home power, motive power for vehicles, global whatever, conservation of whatever.

Having a goal is may as well often be a drunken dream if the way to that goal costs citizens through elevated taxes or by direct spending. The statement that we wish to have cleaner emissions from autos is noble until one realizes that as we get closer to the 100th percentile in cleanliness the dollars go up exponentially.

90% cleaner is relatively do-able with say, hundreds of thousands of dollars. Each percentile closer to 100 gets more expensive. Its millions, then tens of millions and 100s of millions. Who pays for this? You the consumer that's who. Wanna bet it averages $10,000 per vehicle?

All of these noble and often green things are wonderful...until you get the bill.
My friend is engineering editor at Road & Track and they put the hybrid craze in perspective when they amortized out the fact that a Prius' cost being far above an equivalent Corolla would make a user need to drive 66,000 miles a year for 5 years to recoup the additional cost or gas would need to reach $10 a gallon. The Corolla already gets fantastic mileage so the offset that the Prius achieved over it was not that dramatic.

These are the things that dumb people do when they are compelled to do "something." They rush out and throw money away.

Will the much higher initial cost of flourescents coupled with the ultimate expenses required for its disposal as toxic waste really outweigh the supercheap incandescant in every respect in a computer model spanning several decades?

Unfortunately we keep jumping to conclusions a mile away after some learned person proves something to be correct an inch away. Our knee-jerk reaction compells us to do "something, anything, even if it's wrong!"

And we aimlessly go from one questionable thing to another. If tomorrow it was surmized that some degreed guy's calculations show that Q-Tips should be incinerated instead of thrown into landfill for "you name the reason," there would soon be mobilized a legion of panicky putzes demanding safer packaging, more studies, a banning of the manufacture or a switch to cotton balls.

Everyone forgets the fact that pnly 1 person ever died due to product tampering has led to draconian, read expensive to the consumer, legislation of packaging and the associated drama.

Is it really worth 3-4 times higher utility bills simply because the greenies stopped nuclear power's growth when if we'd been continuing on we'd have 30+ years of safer design and knowledge of operation?

So John Q. Public don't complain about prices until you have found out what the TRUE cost is.

 

[scotrace]

Energy efficiency engineering could be a very lucrative business, I reckon.

Indeed it is. The consulting firms are printing money in the cellar. Take your new degree and hasten thither.

 

[Paisley]

The energy it takes to light a bulb seems like a drop in the bucket compared to the energy it takes to heat and cool the mondo houses now being built.

Flat screen TVs are another energy guzzler. I recently read that they consume more energy than a refrigerator. I won't hold my breath waiting for legislation regarding TVs, though!

 

[J. M. Stovall]

The energy it takes to light a bulb seems like a drop in the bucket compared to the energy it takes to heat and cool the mondo houses now being built.

Flat screen TVs are another energy guzzler. I recently read that they consume more energy than a refrigerator. I won't hold my breath waiting for legislation regarding TVs, though!

Where there goes my idea of using a plasma tv in every room for lighting...rats.

 

[Twitch]

Paisley- it's the paradox of the whole topic. One one hand we're urged to conserve, recycle and light candles in the dark and on the other we find fewer and fewer alternate things we can conserve with that do not cause some other problem.

 

[jake_fink]

Where there goes my idea of using a plasma tv in every room for lighting...rats.

lol lol lol

 

[Feraud]

Flat screen TVs are another energy guzzler. I recently read that they consume more energy than a refrigerator. I won't hold my breath waiting for legislation regarding TVs, though!

They can have my flat screen when they pry it from my cold dead hands!