Discussing
The Impending Light Bulb Ban
U.S. law passed in 2007, old-fashioned
bulbs are due to disappear.
If congress wants us to save electricity, why is it pushing electric cars?
Links
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LED Billboards - are the energy efficient?
Article in the United Kingdom "Britons stock up on banned 60 watt bulbs"
Light Bulb Ban Forces Remodeling of
Easy Bake Oven
Homepower Magazine Article
Ask the Experts: Mercury in CFLs.
This article is not about the light bulb ban, but is relevant to U.S. electric
policy. Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers Article:
Can plug-in hybrid electric vehicles keep the electric grid
stable?
One reader pointed out that government subsidy of the 'electric car' is not in
contradiction with the government's hatred of the light bulb, because the
government does see the benefit to increasing electric demand at night (for most
of the year, in most of the USA). The logical assumption is that most
electric car charging will be done at night, a good thing for the electric
utility system. If most home electric lighting demand is at night,
why is the government then forcing a change to home electric light bulbs?
In the USA, businesses use more electricity during the day and
residences use more electricity at night.
By the way, there is no such thing as an automobile that runs on electricity.
They all run on whatever the electric generating plant is consuming to produce
that electricity (coal, gas, oil, uranium). Electricity is just a
means to move that energy into your automobile where the battery stores it until
needed.
Another article at the I.E.E.E. website claims that
LED lighting will be cost effective by the end of the
year.
Yahoo story claims to be
Truth About the New Light Bulb Law expresses a lot of
common sense, but repeats one of the most common government backed lies.
They say "90% of the electricity used was wasted as heat." While it may be true that 90% of
the output from the incandescant lamp is not visible light, it is not wasted;
it is heating your home. If your home or office is heated with
resistance electric heat, than the light bulb is more efficient than your electric
heat because you get to use the light from the bulb before the light is also
converted to heat. Depending where you are in the USA you may be
heating your house more than 5 months per year. So when you get these
'more efficient' light sources, your home heating system will just run more to
make up for it.
So now that we have brought up the subject of heating the house, we should also
mention cooling the home or office. Now we can see an aspect of this light
bulb ban that is valid. If you do reduce the amount of heat from a xx
lumen light source from 100W to 30W, then you do not need to run the 'air
conditioner' to pump out that 70W difference. Multiply that by eight
luminaires for a very large home and the result is 560W (more than 2/3
horsepower.) However, taking this government thought process, we should
outlaw the use of electric fans in 'air conditioned' environments. An
electric fan, by this concept, is 100% waste of electricity. Yes, every
bit of electricity that electric fan uses is turned into heat. A typical
'box fan' on high, using 200W will create some heat directly from the
'inefficient' motor. The fan blades turn all of the remaining energy
into heat. Though you may feel cooler from the evaporation of sweat,
your house is being heated by 100% of the electricity that fan is using.
If you do not understand how this works, read up on
James Prescott Joule's experiments where he measured work and energy.
Are Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFL) the answer?
Not yet. The big problem with compact fluorescent lamps is that
almost all of them are made in china; that means no quality control, and no
regard for product safety.
CFLs are destroyed a little bit each time you turn them on. If you turn
them on and never turn them off (and they were properly designed) they will last
many many years. But if you install them in the laundry room or bathroom
where they will be turned on and off many times per day, you may find that those
mercury laden lamps only last a few weeks!
What about Light Emitting Diodes?
LED (light-emitting diode) lighting is being improved at a fast rate. LEDs
work great in flashlights, but lighting for the home is still quite expensive.
One problem with LED lighting is the colour. Manufacturers are still
struggling with "binning"- that is automated manufacturing methods to measure
the colour of each LED so that the lighting will have consistent coloring.
LEDs have been around since the '60s. They are wonderful as status
indicators, on-off indicators etc. They even make pretty good television
and computer displays these days.
Many people are mistaken in thinking that LEDs do not get hot. That's true
of the little led in your dvd player letting you know if it is on or off, or the
led's in your alarm clock. But when trying to replace 100 watt light bulbs
in your home, heat is even a greater problem that with regular light bulbs.
The regular incandescant lamp has a natural regulating ability. As the
light gets hotter, it draws less current. This tends to help keep the
light at a fairly constant temperature.
LEDs though, have the opposite problem... the hotter they get, the more
electricity they tend to use (if proper 'driver circuitry' is not included).
