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Congress Voting To Repeal Incandescent Bulb Ban
Bob the Super Hamste writes "CNN Money is running as story about a bill Congress is going to vote on today to repeal the 'incandescent light bulb ban' that was put into place during the Bush administration. The bill is supported by Republicans in Congress who are claiming this places unnecessary restrictions on the market. For those of you wondering, it does bring up the standard issues of energy efficiency, mercury (in both the bulbs and that emitted by coal power), and cost of the bulbs. The bill was introduced by Texas Congressman Joe Barton."
How about writing one that makes sense?
This is as close to a modern version of "fiddling while Rome burns."
Glad to see they're not wasting their time on silly things like the budget.
Who did what now?
first?
I have had several CFL's fail within months, completely destroying any potential long-term savings. And do they really think anyone is properly disposing of these bulbs?
I figure there's a pretty good load of money to be made by stockpiling these things and selling them to desperate homeowners in a few years once they're scarce. Anyone who's already started stockpiling may be in for a scare...
Instead of banning incandescent bulbs because they are inefficient, why not simply ban inefficient bulbs? If incandescent bulbs can be made more efficient, it'd be silly to have to repeal or modify a law later.
Maybe I'm nuts, but last time I checked my local store still had plenty of incandescent bulbs for sale. Wait, I can check.
Nope, not nuts..
If there was a ban on these things, it doesn't appear to be working.
I read the internet for the articles.
There never was! There are new efficiency standards, which both GE and Osram Sylvania say they can meet with new incandescents. The whole thing started as a talking point for a Republican primary, and took off when the punditry caught a whiff of it and smelled red meat.
I'm a firm believer in using the tax code to influence behavior. Tax the snot out of them. Considering that my house is entirely lit by canned lighting on dimmer switches, an incandescent ban means I basically have to rewire my house - fluorescent dimmables just don't work. If they were heavily taxed - to the point of being slightly more expensive that the fluorescents - then I would have an alternative, while the majority of the market will still make the choice you want them to. Everybody wins.
this message brought to you by the Acme Kerosene lantern company.
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
why not simply ban inefficient bulbs?
That is exactly what the law does.
If incandescent bulbs can be made more efficient, it'd be silly to have to repeal or modify a law later.
Some companies have in fact done just that, and they are now upset at the prospect of having the law revoked after having spent all that money to comply with it.
Shouldn't we allow the market to handle this? Once the efficiency vs up-front cost gets in the right place, the $$$$ should take care of it, right?.
(assuming any externalities are accounted for some way...)
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
in other news congress bans sharia law
Seriously the first line in the article is "The so-called light bulb ban, set to begin in 2012".
Congress finally balanced the budget and agreed to raise the debt ceiling? I mean it looks like they have time for trivial matters now.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
Several months ago, a CFL broke right next to my 2-year old son. I had the sense to get him out of the room, but not for about 10 seconds.
After much research, I discovered that a CFL has about 4 milligrams of Mercury that is released as a vapor (which is readily absorbed by the body unlike the solid form).
The EPA website's cleanup instructions were vast. They even recommended that all clothing that came in contact with any of the CFL be destroyed. I assumed this also meant the wall-to-wall carpeting in my son's bedroom where he plays.
Do I think the EPA is probably being a bit paranoid? Sure. But this is my son we are talking about during his key mental development years. A little paranoia is in order. Who knows how much mercury vapor he inhaled. Yes, I got rid of the carpet.
I'm personally stocking up on incadescents until LED or Halogon alternatives become viable. BTW-- I vote Democratic ticket and am otherwise pretty liberal.
Not that I'm expect much in the way of impartiality here, but...
"During the Bush Administration"? There's a subtle bit of tweaking going on there... it was passed by a Democratically-controlled Congress (albeit with a Republican pushing it, who has now mea culpa'd and is leading the drive to repeal it) and stuck in a 300 page energy bill.
Background:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-06-10/need-a-light-bulb-uncle-sam-gets-to-choose-virginia-postrel.html
And for more of the right-ward/libertarian spin on why this is a dumb idea, just keep scrolling:
http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit/?s=bulb
Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
LED lights are a much better idea than the, now infamous, "pig tail" CFL's. LED lights use less energy and therefore produce less heat.
If you break a pig tail light, even though it's a miniscule amount, the mercury contained therein constitutes a hazardous spill under current governement regulations. LOL
You can bring them to retailers for recycling but the dirty little secret is many retailers will not accept fluorescent bulbs if they are different from CFL's. OMG, what idiots we are.
Most pig tail lights are not supposed to be used in enclosed lighting fixtures. Do you have any expensive interior or exterior fixtures? TOO BAD, THE GOV'T EXPECTS YOU TO REPLACE THEM. LOL
You are incorrectly assuming that humans are "rational economic actors", or even a close approximation thereof. Sorry.
I was an early adopter of CFL's starting with the Phillips Earth Light back around 1990. Back then they lasted a couple of years. Today CFL's frequently burn out in a month making any energy savings imaginary. Given the issues with mercury and the high failure rate I have switched to quartz halogen capsule bulbs and LED bulbs where I don't need a lot of light. The quartz halogen bulbs are more efficient than regular incandescent bulbs.
But this is appropriate:
http://lightbulbsdirect.com/
Less than fifty cents each if you buy by the case. Stock up now, just in "case".
I have converted to mostly CFLs in my house over the years. I only buy the instant on ones. I usually stock up when they are on a good sale, so I get them at a decent price. About a year ago, i started collecting the burnt out ones in a drawer in my garage to be disposed of properly all at once, saving time. So far I have only collected 2 burnt out CFLs. I have found that putting a CFL in an inclosed light fixture with an incandecent will shorten it's life substantially.
"If memory serves, there was a dubious flirtation with mercury-filled light bulbs resulting in toxic side effects"
This is like repealing a ban on EnergyStar CRT monitors and allowing more wasteful CRTs, just before the lighter, cheaper, much lower-power LCD monitors dropped below them on price and wiped them from the stores.
I refer, of course, to LED lighting. Your homework google for today is "CRI", colour rendering index, where sunlight (and incandescents) = 100. CFLs score in the sixties. Anything much above 80 can be quite hard to tell from incandescent for most eyes. An LED with a CRI of 85 is about to be released by a company called "Switch", profiled by Farhad Manjoo in Slate recently. Unlike CFLs, they really do last for decades under regular use, and save even more power. They're going to get much cheaper over just the next few years, and many claim will use even less power as well.
2011 and 2012 will just see early adopters, but by 2015, the end of incandescents will be as obvious as the end of LaserDisc was in 2000, if not quite gone yet.
First, the law only specified the necessary efficiency a bulb required. It didn't specify technology.
Two, there already exist more efficient, albeit more expensive, incandescent light bulbs.
Three, even if you don't believe in global warming, one must believe that there is a finite amount of electricity we can generate. Simply because that amount is large is not a good reason to waste it because 'you want choice'. Sorry, greater good should win out here since nothing of value is being lost (since the only thing being trampled is the pride of complacent, ignorant morons who care nothing for the future of humanity).
Since when has it been Congress' job to be everything that is wrong with the USA? I mean, they can't even get the budget up to par and working correctly, and now they're bothering with repealing more green energy initiatives....but why?
Of course, because Philips and GE, and the entirety of the oil/energy industry probably threw millions of dollars or more at campaign contributions and lobbying to keep their existing product lines available. Greener technology means less energy consumed, and less energy consumed means less money for the providers.
Until we ban the outright sale of law and votes to corporations based on contributions and lobbying, this country will continue to march backward right into its grave.
Fuck the entire government, hard, sideways with a barbed metal pole.
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
Why not repeal the mandate to require 1.6 gal/flush toilets?
We heard the same lame arguments against that back then, but guess what? IT WORKED!!!
[citation needed]
With the competition open, what are the odds the prices of the CFL bulbs will go down right away?
The ones in my house are all around 4 years old, still going strong. That is half the reason I buy them. Replacing bulbs is a pain, I like not having to do it very often.
Glad to see they're not wasting their time on silly things like the budget.
Congress has to handle more than one issue at a time...
Running this nation is a very complex issue, and our representatives in Washington are working dozens and hundreds of issues at any one time.
If they were to drop everything and deal with only one important issue at a time, there would be stasis, and the nation would descend into Anarchy.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Dont you mean the Democratic Controlled Congress during the Bush Era?
For those who would like to actually read it the bill it is H.R.2417 and here is the complete text of the bill.
Time to offend someone
It's not nearly as bad as you seem to think. Please read this.
It's only vapor for a fraction of a second if the bulb is turned on when it breaks. Even then it quickly converts back to a solid once it's in the open air. It doesn't fill the room or propagate or anything. He almost certainly inhaled none of it. Replacing the carpet was certainly unnecessary and a bit of an extreme paranoid reaction (first time parent?).
I thought similar until I saw the numbers. Electric heat is one of the least efficient forms there is. For homes with gas heat, relying on incandescent lamps for their heating is just wasteful. It's much more efficient to minimize electricity use by using CFLs and use more efficient gas for actual heating. When trying to cool your house the savings go way up by not having so much heat load.
Something else is all the people complaining about the cost of CFL bulbs. Even with failures, the electricity savings by using CFLs is huge. I have those light bars in my bathrooms that could either be 360 watts of incandescent lamps or, with CFLs, just 90 watts for more light output. I use CFLs everywhere that I can. The only exceptions are the oven, refrigerator, and the ceiling fans that have candelabra base bulbs and maybe those are available as CFL now.
There was a very easily noticed drop in my electric bill when I switched over - especially in the summer due to the reduced heat load for the air conditioning.
It all adds up, folks. The electric savings due to using CFL lamps is huge. That's a hell of a lot of coal and natural gas that isn't being burned and it cuts the need for nuclear.
There is a bigger picture than just that you had to pay a buck or two for a CFL instead of 50 cents for an incandescent.
Just so we are clear - there never was an incandescent light bulb ban; this was/is spin.
mov ah, 4ch
int 21h
Not CFLs, you are right those dim for shit, but Philips has new LED lights that are actually worth getting. What you are after is the Philips AmbientLED Dimmable A19. As far as I know, it is exclusive to Home Depot currently, but they all have them. It is a real, no shit, replacement for an A19 bulb. Its luminous efficacy is equal to or above CFLs (which isn't true for many LEDs), it dims properly using a normal dimmer, and it fits in normal sockets. Funny looking bulb, but it does the job and it is white when it lights up.
The downside is, of course, upfront cost. They are expensive little things. However being LEDs they ought to last a decade or two which combined with low energy usage means they are likely to be a net win.
I got them for my living room because I was really tired of having to get out the ladder to change bulbs, and because dimmable CFLs are crap. I'd been stuck on incandescents but tried these. They work great. I just have a standard Lutron dimmer and all I had to do was put the bulbs in the sockets and it works right.
Now I'm not advocating an incandescent ban or anything, I am making you aware of a new, high tech, option you've got. I love the things, despite the cost, because they work well and I don't have to replace them all the time. Plus they look neat :).
Its all about sensibly assessing risk. Something we as a species, suck at.
Getting rid of the carpet is probably overkill. Get it steam cleaned and be done with it: either that is enough to pull the mercury out, or its now permanently part of your carpet. Either way it is unlikely to harm the kid unless the kid ingests the carpet. I suspect that's the worry on clothing, since kids will stick their shirt in their mouth and suck on it.
Of course that ignores all the nasty chemicals they use in steam-cleaning equipment, so...
Slashdot Patriotism: We Support our Dupes!
Yes, I got rid of the carpet.
i hope you checked all the ingredients in the new carpet against chances of causing developmental problems..
i also hope if you where that paranoid that you properly disposed of this now contaminated carpet - rather than throw it in the trash to go to a land fill to allow it to enter the water table where your son will now drink it from the faucet.
and if you are that worried - you might want to avoid fish all together..
'...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'
I don't know about you, but I care enough to put them in ziploc bags, and return them to the hardware store. What happens to them, after that, however, I'm not so sure about.
The absorption rate for inhaled mercury is very high; it is far more toxic than swallowing the same quantity. An age-appropriate intake of selenium in the long-term goes some way to addressing mercury exposure.
If all the money invested in developing dirty greenwashed fluros had been spent on developing LEDs then we wouldn't be having this conversation.
I personally refuse to use CFLs. Their failure rate is higher than the best-case examples that are presented as being the norm. And I really don't want to experience one exploding again.
Dear Republicans:
There is no incandescent light bulb ban.
A long time ago, people played with mercury using their bare hands.
This was on the order of 1,000+ times more than the 0.004 grams you're talking about.
Granted, it's not something you'd want to drink, but in the quantities you mentioned, it's harmless.
Mercury can be turned to radioactive gold if you can get the right isotope (Mercury 194). That will decay to Platinum 194 (stable) in about a month with 99.9999% of the radioactivity gone. If there's an efficient way to do this, there is a financial incentive to make Hg scarce.
The law was supposed to ban inefficient bulbs, but it never took into account mercury content or properly disposing of light bulbs. This is a classic case of tragedy of the commons as no one I know of properly disposes of the light bulbs. Matter of a fact in my area you have to drive about 30 minutes and pay roughly $1.40 to get rid of each CFL that burns out. Who the frick actually does that?
CFLs are sold for prices that underscores their long term effects and disposal to make them seem more plausible. The law which bans inefficient light bulbs to reduce pollution, doesn't take into account long term pollution, just the energy use of the bulbs themselves. I'm not so sure CFLs would either be cheaper or be more 'efficient' when taking into account mercury disposal costs and proper recycling.
The sad thing is, while we may understand that the law bans inefficient bulbs, I don't think that is the general understanding for most people (even on here) and the general consensus is CFLs are better for the environment and last longer. However, buying a good incandescent also has similar effects. It's propaganda based on poison, quite literally because people can't see or rationalize the effects of mercury as it's not included in the price or the label and laws like this as well as marketing has made incandescents seem like terribly ungreen.
If they undo this law they better have another one to take up it's place that includes some sort of rating system for lightbulbs and their effects on the environment (all of them) along with costs that include recycling.
And why exactly do we need our government to tell us what kind of bulbs to buy? Is our government THAT wise?
http://suddendisruption.blogspot.com/search/label/Energy%20Star
Or are we THAT foolish?
Sudden Disruption
Like I said, there is a huge difference between mercury in the solid form and mercury in the vaporized form.
We have had energy efficiency standards for other appliances since the Reagan administration. I think most people would agree this has been a good thing.
Why don't they just re-classify Incandescent bulbs as primarily a heat source instead of a light source, like other countries already have to keep them in production.
First time parent, and too young to remember when mercury wasn't scary.
Yes, my new carpet is hand-tufted all-natural Wool. Thanks for questioning that.
Sounds like a conservative circle jerk in here. Gotta love the right wing purchasing of major media sites, particularly like Slashdot.
A) The law only mentions the incandescant bulb as a reference to what they're phasing out. The law never states that you "MUST" use CFL, only that bulbs need to meet a certain efficiency rating.
B) I always laugh at people who complain about mercury in a CFL. Up until very recently, that is, the past 15 years, we used to stick glass mercury sticks in our mouths *for hundreds of years*. In each of these sticks, it could contain up to 3 grams of mercury (Source: Wikipedia) If you want to use the EPA numbers, the EPA says that they contained 500mg of Mercury.
According to the EPA, your average CFL has 4mg of Mercury, or rather, it takes 125 CFL bulbs to equal that of *ONE* glass thermometer.
I'm not saying that Mercury isn't bad, because it is--but the reality is we used to stick MUCH more of it IN OUR MOUTHS, and most of you on here probably grew up doing so.
Incandescent lights are real cheap to produce, because they are simple. Bit of tungsten wire in a (near) vacuum encased in glass. Done. No power control necessary, feed line voltage straight to it. CFLs and LED are a good bit more complex. Not only because the bulb/element themselves are more expensive to produce, but because of the power control. Have to have a set of electronics to deal with getting the power to a form that works for them.
So they are likely to always be more expensive up front, by a good bit. Now their life more than makes up for it, never mind efficiency. You save money. Ok fine, but people are short sighted. Our culture is one where buying more expensive stuff for longer term savings is not popular. People want to save money now and buy cheap.
Two problems:
1) The whole mercury issue is overblown, and also trivial to solve. You just use CFL capsules and then you don't have to worry about mercury. The capsule encapsulates the glass bulb, and is nearly indestructible. You can break the capsule with a hammer, but even if you squeeze really hard, you can't crush it with your hand. Mercury is not easily released. Capsules are suitable for CFL's not installed in enclosed fixtures.
2) The biggest problem with the CFL market I see is the lack of quality control. You buy a cheapie CFL from your local dollar store. The spectrum emitted by the phosphor makes your house look like crap. Your wife makes you swear to never install CFL's in her house ever again. CFL's with better quality control, not-the-cheapest phosphor, cold cathode, and more durable electronics cost closer to $10 than $1. Stores don't sell them because the average consumer is accustomed to buying the cheapest incandescent lamp they can find, and not noticing a difference between the generic and the brand-name incandescent lamp.
3) It's really hard to manage color-temperature when you go to CFL. If you select a high-color temperature 6500K "daylight" CFL, and only install one 13-watt lamp to light up your bathroom, the light will look terrible and unhealthy. Replace it with a 2700K or 2650K CFL, and the light will look much more natural. Repeat with ten times the lumens, and then the results are the opposite. The daylight lamps will look a lot better than the warm-white lamps when the light is very bright, like in an office environment. You basically have to do work and put thought into selecting the color temperature of your lamps when lighting your home.
Basically, CFL's and even LED's need better quality standards and better labeling. Without that, it's harder to use them residentially and get attractive results.
Wow. Just wow. I grew up in the country, rooting around in god knows what garbage, banging my knees, stepping on nails, and generally playing around in locations or situations that would make a modern parent vomit in revulsion. And yes, I have had CFL "sword fights" as a kid.
These days, I laugh my ass of seeing people who lived with strict, uber-clean, uber-safe parents cringe at the sight of dirt, get sick at the slightest contact with any foreign substance, and get rashes from leaning their arms on tables that have not been damn near sterilized by those cleaning spray things that are so popular these days.
And the kids that THESE parents are bringing up. My god, I just pity their future.
Well.. that's a tough one. Most people when faced with a choice - say to buy a $1 bulb thqtwill last a few months or pay for a $10 bulb that says it will last a few years and save you $15 in that time - will choose the one with more immediate perceived benefit. For further reference look at the average credit card debt per household.
A bill calling for light bulbs to become gradually more efficient beginning in 2012 and ending in 2020 -- what critics are calling a ban -- passed in 2007 with bipartisan support and was signed into law by then-President George W. Bush.
It's an efficiency regulation. Just like we used to do for cars.
I'm a firm believer in using the tax code to influence behavior. Tax the snot out of them.
Just like how well it works for cigarettes and alcohol?
Mercury will always become a vapor. It is called partial pressure. Opening all windows and leaving the room is best way to get rid off most of it. And mercury is not a solid, it's a liquid. That's why it was used in *thermometers*.
How much mercury in a can of tuna thanks to coal? How about 0.2ug Hg/g of meat. So if you eat 200g of tuna, you are eating 40ug of Mercury. So, each CFL contains about 100 cans of tuna worth of Mercury, if you inhale it all.
Right?
Well, not quite. Mercury in the fish is organic compound (methylmercury). The one in the bulb is metallic. The organic mercury is very much more dangerous as it accumulates in your body. The metallic mercury is not great, but most will eventually be removed.
But this is my son we are talking about during his key mental development years.
HA!! Mental development happens throughout life. If all of it happened in childhood, we would all be fucked.
Secondly, mercury is not that problematic to the brain. The brain can wire around most of the damage and *massive* continuous dosages are needed to impair the brain. Where it is problematic because of kills kidney function.
Anyway, replacing the carpet and not using CFLs there is probably a good idea. Carpets are impossible to cleanup from anything. Also, not eating any fish larger than sardine is probably also a good idea, if you want to avoid mercury.
The ban is all about taking care of the externalities that the market has failed on.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
After reading that link I'm more concerned about them than I was before.
(assuming any externalities are accounted for some way...)
Haaaahahahahahahahaha. Because the market is *great* at accounting for externalities, isn't it? Gaahahahahahaha. Let's go ahead and lump pollution in the "assume this natural resource issue will solve itself" category. Baahahahahaha. Good one!
Hey, a bunch of kids from Africa called, they wanted to know who they can thank for the brain damage caused by all the lead vapor laden exhaust fumes they breathed. Should I take a message? Oh, and a school of Blue Walleye called, wait no they didn't they are extinct thanks to the free market externality accounting system, which in case you haven't seen it is a garbage can labeled "AMF YOYO".
Shouldn't it be a freedom issue?
I have seen the damage a 4 light fixture can do to your electric bill.
I use a mixture of CFL's, LED's and three incandescent bulbs in my house.
Until the light color and Lumens from LED's is there, their utility is limited.
GE makes a 40 watt bulb with fins which puts out the correct color of light. I have a couple of those.
Sylvania makes a 60 watt bulb (which is actually about 60 lumens low (800 vs 860)) but the light is distinctly red and can only be used in lamps with brown shades.
If GE steps up to 60 watts, or Sylvania gets a little bluer I'm there.
But I can afford $20 for a single bulp. Many can't. Even tho it saves you about $5 per year in electric costs it is going take a while to cover a $20 bulb that lasts about 7 years.
I dislike CFL-- even the "instant" ones still only power on at about 70% light and take 60-90 seconds to finish powering on. I can watch the light crawl through the coils in the 75 watt cfl in my utility room.
I think in 3-4 years, LED's will be down below $10, the right color, and use 20% of the power (and not drive up your cooling bill) and still last 7 years. No need to outlaw incandescents. The transition will happen on it's own.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
I truly sympathize with you. One of my friends and I were talking and only very slightly exaggerating in saying that a broken CFL is a haz-mat situation. I've got almost all the incandescent bulbs in my house replaced with (mostly) CFL and LED bulbs. I really really like the LED bulb technology, but there aren't a lot of choices. I recently replaced a kind of hard to get to circline bulb with an LED circline bulb and I could not be happier with the LED replacement. I've got one room in my house completely using LED bulbs too. I wish they would drop in price but I've been pretty happy with the quality of light from them.
You're definitely paranoid. (And of course the EPA is -- they're a bureaucracy; the first job of a bureaucracy is to expand the bureaucracy.)
Yeah, you don't want to spend a lot of time (read months or years) inhaling mercury vapors, but it's not that bad (worry more about radon -- had your house checked?). You got rid of the carpet? I hope it's one you were planning to replace anyway. I used to -- as a kid, with younger siblings -- play with mercury all the time (I had about a pound of it, great fun to pour from hand to hand, squish droplets on the table, etc...). Yeah, the metal isn't the vapor, but some does evaporate off. But it's mecury compounds that you have to worry about (methyl mercury will go right through your skin), not the elemental. (BTW, the "solid form" of mercury only occurs at -40F (= -40C), so that's not something you'd normally have to worry about at the best of times.)
There's a hell of a lot more mercury in old standard fluorescents (you can see droplets of the stuff when the tubes get old), plenty of kids have been around those when they broke. You know, those same tubes they typically use for school lighting.
Seriously, you probably did more harm to your son's mental development by him seeing you freak out over the incident than ten seconds -- or even ten minutes, or ten hours -- of being in the same room with a broken CFL would have done.
So trying to figure out the debt ceiling stand-off or the many wars the country is engaged in is clearly less important than repealing a regulation that doesn't even take place for many months?
Sigh. I think I'm going to look for a place to buy gold bricks, just in case the debate on this takes us through end of July.
Michal
Thank you, GOP!
Signed,
your loyal Easy-Bake constituency
I only post comments when someone on the internet is wrong.
Here are the EPA recommendations for cleaning up a CFL spill:
http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup.html
http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup-detailed.html
Where did you see anything about clothing?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
When they do, it's a no brainer.
CFLs have the mercury issue and the dimness period before full power. The energy savings, of course, are nice.
But LEDs are solid state, instant on, you can use a dimmer switch with them. They last longer than CFL and they save more energy to. Best of all, they mimic natural daylight the best. Fluorescent is too harsh and incandescent is too hot.
But of course, still a little too pricey. Whoever gets LED Bulbs to the magic price point will reap my gratitude (and a lot of purchases)
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The main difference is that solid mercury *does not exist* under normal ambient conditions. It melts at -40 degrees.
Several months ago, a CFL broke right next to my 2-year old son. I had the sense to get him out of the room, but not for about 10 seconds. After much research, I discovered that a CFL has about 4 milligrams of Mercury that is released as a vapor (which is readily absorbed by the body unlike the solid form). The EPA website's cleanup instructions were vast. They even recommended that all clothing that came in contact with any of the CFL be destroyed. I assumed this also meant the wall-to-wall carpeting in my son's bedroom where he plays. Do I think the EPA is probably being a bit paranoid? Sure. But this is my son we are talking about during his key mental development years. A little paranoia is in order. Who knows how much mercury vapor he inhaled. Yes, I got rid of the carpet. I'm personally stocking up on incadescents until LED or Halogon alternatives become viable. BTW-- I vote Democratic ticket and am otherwise pretty liberal.
I've run in to the same issue. I was changing a CFL and it shattered in to tiny pieces. I have two young kids at home and based on what the EPA recommends you need to call in professionals to clean your house and remove any surface, specifically cloth or carpet, that could be contaminated. Also you should put the broken light bulb in a glass jar and properly dispose of it. Scary stuff. I'd much rather just have to clean up some broken pieces of glass.
Awesome! I love incandescent light bulbs!
... Either way it is unlikely to harm the kid unless the kid ingests the carpet...
So then it is a real concern as it is likely a child, especially under 3, would do something like eat the carpet or something that touched the carpet. I know my kids try and eat anything they can get their hands on.
Yes, such as the sold form doesn't exist.
At least, not in an environment in which you could also exist.
I hope you're not really a Dr because you're a fucking idiot.
After much research, I discovered that a CFL has about 4 milligrams of Mercury that is released as a vapor
I don't think so. Mercury's vapor pressure at 30ÂC is 1Pa. To put that into perspective water's vapor pressure at that temperature is 4247 Pa. So upon breakage that mecury remains in liquid form, not a vapor.
I laughed at the weak who considered themselves good because they lacked claws.
What to Do if a Compact Fluorescent Light (CFL) Bulb or Fluorescent Tube Light Bulb Breaks in Your Home: Detailed Recommendations
Note that these steps are precautions and reflect best practices for cleaning up a broken CFL. If you are unable to follow them fully, don't be alarmed. CFLs contain a very small amount of mercury less than 1/100th of the amount in a mercury thermometer. However, if you are concerned about the risk to your health from a potential exposure to mercury, consult your physician.
NOTE: IN MY OPINION THIS IS AN INTENTIONAL EFFORT AT DECEPTION. THEY FAILED TO MENTION THAT ONLY 0.01% OF INGESTED LIQUID MERCURY IS ABSORBED BY THE BODY, WHILE 80% OF INHALED MERCURY VAPOR IS ABSORBED. THAT'S A FACTOR OF 8000x, HARDLY THE "1/100th of the amount" cited in this document
Before Cleanup
Have people and pets leave the room, and avoid the breakage area on the way out.
Open a window or door to the outdoors and leave the room for 510 minutes.
Shut off the central forcedair heating/air conditioning (HVAC) system, if you have one.
Collect materials you will need to clean up the broken bulb:
Stiff paper or cardboard
Sticky tape (e.g., duct tape)
Damp paper towels or disposable wet wipes (for hard surfaces)
Glass jar with a metal lid (such as a canning jar) or a sealable plastic bag(s)
Cleanup Steps for Hard Surfaces
Carefully scoop up glass fragments and powder using stiff paper or cardboard and place debris and paper/cardboard in a glass jar with a metal lid. If a glass jar is not available, use a sealable plastic bag. (NOTE: Since a plastic bag will not prevent the mercury vapor from escaping, remove the plastic bag(s) from the home after cleanup.)
Use sticky tape, such as duct tape, to pick up any remaining small glass fragments and powder. Place the used tape in the glass jar or plastic bag.
Wipe the area clean with damp paper towels or disposable wet wipes. Place the towels in the glass jar or plastic bag.
Vacuuming of hard surfaces during cleanup is not recommended unless broken glass remains after all other cleanup steps have been taken. [NOTE: It is possible that vacuuming could spread mercurycontaining powder or mercury vapor, although available information on this problem is limited.] If vacuuming is needed to ensure removal of all broken glass, keep the following tips in mind:
Keep a window or door to the outdoors open;
Vacuum the area where the bulb was broken using the vacuum hose, if available; and
Remove the vacuum bag (or empty and wipe the canister) and seal the bag/vacuum debris, and any materials used to clean the vacuum, in a plastic bag.
Promptly place all bulb debris and cleanup materials, including vacuum cleaner bags, outdoors in a trash container or protected area until materials can be
disposed of properly.
Check with your local or state government about disposal requirements in your area. Some states and communities require fluorescent bulbs (broken or unbroken) be taken to a local recycling center.
Wash your hands with soap and water after disposing of the jars or plastic bags containing bulb debris and cleanup materials.
Continue to air out the room where the bulb was broken and leave the HVAC system shut off, as practical, for several hours.
Cleanup Steps for Carpeting or Rugs
Carefully scoop up glass fragments and powder using stiff paper or cardboard and place debris and paper/cardboard in a glass jar with a metal lid. If a glass jar is not available, use a sealable plastic bag. (NOTE: Since a plastic bag will not prevent the mercury vapor from escaping, remove the plastic bag(s) from the home after cleanup.)
Use sticky tape, such as duct tape,
...and if you don't get it cleaned up properly, or a "friend" or neighbor reports the "spill" then you can expect a visit from a hazmat team which will be forced to ensure that all of the heavy metal is removed. Which means tearing out the carpet, probably the flooring, throwing out all items in the room, and there's a good chance they'll be tromping in and out of your house for a week in bunny suits and getting hosed off on your front lawn. But hey, it's all for the good of the environment.
Oh, and they'll stick you for the bill too - to the tune of a $150k.
http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2011/05/two_tablespoons_of_mercury_spi.html
Manufactures of fluorescent bulbs are making false about the brighness fro their products.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/6110547/Energy-saving-light-bulbs-offer-dim-future.html
Where is the debate of closing light bulb plants here so they can operate the CFL plants in china? F those low light, take 10 min to warm up, always has a weak starter so it strobes at 60hz mercury filled CFL's.
You know what I'll do, I'll buy me some of them fancy new "heat balls" to, you know, "heat" my living room. They are cheap and fit nicely into my existing lamp holders.
Seriously though the ban has enough loop holes to drive a truck through. The ban does not affect special purpose lamps. A rough service bulb does not have to meet the efficiency standards, neither do appliance (cold and hot environment) lamps. I believe decorative lamps are also excepted, such as those globe lamps used on bathroom mirrors and the candle looking lamps used on chandeliers.
It will raise the price of these lamps but the incandescent lamps will still be available. What does bother me about all of these regulations on efficiency and pollution is that, first, this is driving much of the manufacturing out of the USA. This country can no longer manufacture things like light bulbs and solar panels because the environmental requirements are so strict. Second, much of these regulations on pollution is based on a still disputed claim over "climate change" caused by human activity.
It has become obvious to me that much of the regulations on "climate change" is nothing more than a wealth redistribution scheme. The USA is held to a different carbon output standard than China. There should be no surprise to anyone that doing so drives manufacturing from the USA to China. That is not only unsurprising but a desired outcome, because if these people were really concerned about pollution then all nations would be held to the same standard.
If the government wants to have this country reduce its carbon output the solution is simple, stop with this bureaucratic nonsense and let people build nuclear power plants. If we had a large portion of our power from nuclear power then it would not matter what kind of lighting we buy. It is quite possible that coal power would have been obsoleted by now if the government had not held up new construction of nuclear power for three decades. Add nuclear power along with hydro, wind, and maybe even solar* and we would not need coal. We'd probably still need to burn some natural gas and diesel for peak loads and emergency power but we should have had the dirty coal plants priced out of the market by now.
* Solar power is still, even after many decades of research, very expensive. It will likely remain as a special purpose power source for all time. Combine the expense with the inherent unreliability of solar power and it just does not make much sense for grid power.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
The measure is before the House. It will then go to the Senate where it will be shot down. Congress refers to both the Senate and the House of Representatives.
I saw a news story on NBC a couple of years ago about the last incandescent light factory in the USA being shut down and people being put out of work because of the ban. If I remember correctly (and I'm pretty sure that I do) they even mentioned the equipment being shipped over seas. So now that they have destroyed another American industry, congress is willing to rethink an obviously bad decision? How much energy will be wasted in importing light bulbs? I guess the repeal won't really impact the trade imbalance, since I doubt if we are making the CFLs here either. So we will be able to buy incandescent lamps, but they will be over priced and cheaply made crap that will only last a few months (if the last that long), just like the crappy CFLs.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
FYI, electric heat is 100% efficient.
The reason we subjugate ourselves to law is to better procure justice. If law does not accomplish this purpose then it m
This is wrong. You are assuming a "space heater" works like an electric heating system. An electric heating system has inefficiencies due to losses in the wiring and ventilation system. With a space heater-- which includes a lighting device-- 100% of the energy that makes it to the device is radiated as heat or becomes heat once it strikes an opaque surface.
You just finished telling us that lighting makes for an inefficient heating system. Yet, in your house you observed a large heat load caused by incandescents.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
You should start lobbying pretty hard to have all coal fired power plants shut down then, as they are a major source of mercury in the environment (fish, air, water...)
Bursting incandescent bulbs with all those glass slivers don't belong near kids either.
How much Mercury is in the air pollution coming out of coal powerplants?
LED is a viable alternative, they work great for most of my lights.
To late for the GE lamp Plant in my Home town. It's gone and has been for years now. This will be a boon for cheap incandescent bulbs produced in China and the Eastern European countries! Does anyone know if there are any incandescent bulbs actually still produced in the USA? Might be a few specialty ones, but I bet the majority of plants have been shutdown and possibly bulldozed by now! To Little to Late as usual!
So then it is a real concern as it is likely a child, especially under 3, would do something like eat the carpet or something that touched the carpet. I know my kids try and eat anything they can get their hands on.
No, the concern isn't about eating something that touched the carpet. The carpet does not generate mercury from thin air continuously. There is a fixed amount that got on it and it either comes out or it stays in. You get out whatever comes out, and whatever left isn't to be worried about (again, unless you kid actually eats the carpet). If the steam cleaner cannot remove the mercury with water and chemicals, it's not suddenly going to all migrate into your kids food the instant a potato chip lands on it. If you think so, then I suggest cleaning your carpet with potato chips to get it all out.
True in that 99% of the electric power is converted to heat. The problem lies in that electric heat is not always cost effective in a cold climate since it takes a lot of voltage to generate the amount of energy needed to heat forced air in a cold climate. Natural gas heat, on the other hand, is not 100% efficient but is much more cost effective source of forced air heat in most cold climate areas. All this is dependent on the home, geographic locality, the type of heater used (traditional, heat pump, etc), the price of natural gas, the price of electricity, temperature of the house, outside temp, insulation, windows, etc. For example, 220v base board heating might be more cost effective for small homes than forced gas heat. Such heaters are very popular in the ski country in Colorado particularly in condos. A friend of mine owns an older home on a lake in CT and let some buddies use it for a week in the winter. His power bill for that one week was $2,000. They turned all the baseboard heaters on. You could ague that the house was simply not designed for heating but he is able to heat the house much more cost effectively now with gas heat. So, you will generally never see electric forced air heating in homes in Minnesota for example. They are very common in Georgia however where electricity is cheap and the number of cold months is much less than MN.
They do, in fact, have candelabra-base CFLs now. I picked up a three-pack for the ceiling fan in my new condo when I moved, and they work great.
For the refrigerator and oven, though, I would stick with incandescent (or if you're really looking to save energy and don't mind spending a bit more, go with LED) because CFLs tend to be more temperature sensitive. I bought a whole bunch of the same brand of CFLs, and the ones being used indoors are still going after like 5 years but the ones installed on the porch light outside would only last a few months.
LOL it sounds like your son will have greater barriers to his future, namely your ridiculous over protection will turn him into the worlds biggest pussy. I'm going to teach my kids to prey on this sissy. They will destroy him.
And... The mercury?
Also, the north is having a problem with the ban on incandescent light bulbs. Did you know that the heat from those things melted the snow from things light light posts and traffic lights? Yeah, LEDs don't. Kind of sucks not knowing who has the green light...
Food for thought: What physical property do you believe makes it a vapor? Does that necessary physical property exist outside the bulb?
CONGRESS get banned!
This sig is not paradoxical or ironic.
It's only vapor at low pressure when it's in the bulb. It condenses when the bulb breaks. Elemental mercury in any form isn't particularly well-absorbed by the body, though. Realistically, 4 mg of elemental mercury poses no significant danger to people. Unfortunately, policymakers insist on using the most cautious possible language, so they tell you to clean or get rid of anything that can absorb mercury (like fibers).
Ya. That's like saying, well they only need to be 98%+ efficient and the only technology out there that meets that criteria is nuclear, so all light bulbs must now be nuclear.
So by saying they have to be X efficient you are basically saying that Y technology is banned, if it is unable to be that efficient.
Personally I think the ban is stupid, not from an economic perspective, but from a life cycle approach. I bet if we looked at the whole energy co-efficient from a manufacturing, usage, and disposal perspective, CFL's wouldn't be as sexy anymore.
I mean if anyone actually reads the box of these things, they are full of mercury, and require special disposal, but I bet 99.9% of them go to the landfill. Not to mention classic bulbs are basically glass, some tungsten, and a bit of metal. I couldn't even tell you what all is in a CFL. But I bet it takes a lot more energy to make one.
Don't know if this is a troll or not, but I'm pretty sure a tiny bit of mercury exposure one time, no matter what the form, is going to hurt anyone. The people who landed men on the moon probably played with mercury as children, many times. Einstein probably played with it. Many of us did the same.
It is by my will alone my thoughts acquire motion; it is by the juice of the coffee bean that the thoughts acquire speed
The EPA website's cleanup instructions were vast.
Cleaning Up a Broken CFL
When a fluorescent bulb breaks in your home, some of this mercury is released as mercury vapor.
These steps are precautions and reflect best practices for cleaning up a broken CFL. If you are unable to follow them fully, don't be alarmed. CFLs contain a very small amount of mercury -- less than 1/100th of the amount in a mercury thermometer. However, if you are concerned about the risk to your health from a potential exposure to mercury, consult your physician.
Before cleanup
Have people and pets leave the room.
Air out the room for 5-10 minutes by opening a window or door to the outdoor environment.
Shut off the central forced air heating/air-conditioning system, if you have one.
Collect materials needed to clean up broken bulb:
stiff paper or cardboard;
sticky tape;
damp paper towels or disposable wet wipes (for hard surfaces); and
a glass jar with a metal lid or a sealable plastic bag.
During cleanup
Be thorough in collecting broken glass and visible powder.
Place cleanup materials in a sealable container.
After cleanup
Promptly place all bulb debris and cleanup materials outdoors in a trash container or protected area until materials can be disposed of properly.
Avoid leaving any bulb fragments or cleanup materials indoors.
If practical, continue to air out the room where the bulb was broken and leave the heating/air conditioning system shut off for several hours.
Cleaning Up a Broken CFL
Future Cleaning of Carpeting or Rugs: Air Out the Room During and After Vacuuming
1.The next several times you vacuum the rug or carpet, shut off the H&AC system if you have one, close the doors to other rooms, and open a window or door to the outside before vacuuming. Change the vacuum bag after each use in this area.
2.After vacuuming is completed, keep the H&AC system shut off and the window or door to the outside open, as practical, for several hours.
Detailed Recommendations
These clean-up recommendations are more or less what you expect for any accidental toxic spill in the home.
Actions You Can Take to Prevent Broken Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs
Always switch off and allow a working CFL bulb to cool before handling.
Always handle CFL bulbs carefully to avoid breakage.
If possible, screw/unscrew the CFL by holding the plastic or ceramic base, not the glass tubing.
Gently screw in the CFL until snug. Do not over-tighten.
Never forcefully twist the glass tubing.
Do not install CFLs in table lamps and floor lamps that can be easily knocked over, in unprotected light fixtures, or in lamps that are incompatible with the spiral or folded shape of many CFLs.
Do not use CFL bulbs in locations where they can easily be broken, such as play spaces.
Use CFL bulbs that have a glass or plastic cover over the spiral or folded glass tube, if available. These types of bulbs look more like incandescent bulbs and may be more durable if dropped.
Consider using a drop cloth (e.g., plastic sheet or beach towel) when changing a fluorescent light bulb in case a breakage should occur. The drop cloth will help prevent mercury contamination of nearby surfaces and can be bundled with the bulb debris for disposal.
Bought house 4 years ago. Replaced every other vanity light bulb in master bathroom = 5 new good brand CFLs. 3 years later, all have burned out while the 5 incandescents are still going strong. Waste of money. Same thing with outdoor CFLs that are on 3 hours per night. Incandescents outlasted those too.
I thought it was a requirement.
The proper way to use tax code to influence behavior is to tax electricity, and let the consumers and markets decide where to save and spend electricity according to their means, needs, and values. Those that want to burn electricity with incandescent bulbs would be allowed to. Or is the bulb ban not really about reducing energy usage, and really is about control and moral imposition?
Like when we got a bit from the Dentist, or a broken thermometer, and rolled it around in our palms for a while 'cause it was cool. But, hey - you know - think of the children and all that.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Just tax inefficiency
During the recent debate over the debt ceiling, the Republican majority in the U.S. House of Representatives has promised to vote no on any measure that increases the revenue of the United States by at least one cent. What tax would you cut to make room for a tax on inefficiency so that the total tax does not increase?
Yeah I know, voting straight Democratic ticket IS pretty idiotic.
they've never talked about banning tin foil.
that the people who bring this up are actually concerned about mercury. If you check them out you'll find that most of them are just desperate for any excuse they can come up with to justify their whining like spoiled four year olds.
and sense of entitlement is of no concern to anyone else.
All mercury exposure does harm, it's a matter of degrees of harm.
I think that it is pretty clear that your average consumer wants the lighting in his house to make things look nice. Right now, they know if they take an incandescent of a certain wattage and put it into socket A, they are going to get the result they want. That is not the consumer experience of CFLs. Absent the ability to predict how the light will perform in the home, they are not going to want to switch. They will be fine with saving money if they can get the quality they want without becoming a lighting professional. Since Congress' legislation basically does nothing to address consumers' genuine needs, it is stupid. They also need to outlaw sucky lighting options so that everything on the shelf is as good as, or better than, incandescent unless it has big letters saying "this lighting sucks."
Unnecessary paranoia. Four milligrams. And some CFLs have only 1mg. If you carefully cracked the bulb open to avoid producing glass shards and immediately tried to snort the result you probably wouldn't inhale all of it, some of the mercury would stay coating the particles on the inside of the glass, you wouldn't need a trip to the hospital because of the mercury, and you wouldn't get brain damage or genetic disorders. You'd be stupid but healthy. Do the same thing every day -- chronic exposure -- or start smashing whole boxes full of large fluorescent bulbs and stay in the room with the windows closed, and you would be in trouble. Most people probably get more chronic mercury exposure from coal-fired power plants, eating tuna, and from amalgam tooth fillings than a single smashed CFL in a room.
Clean broken CFLs up like any other broken glass from any kind of lightbulb (i.e. carefully and thoroughly), put it in a sealed plastic bag, and dispose of it at a proper disposal center rather than ordinary trash. The EPA website instructions aren't "vast" unless you consider 2 or 3 pages "vast" for detailed instructions, and most of the information there is kind of obvious (like: don't vacuum it up if you can avoid it, but if you must do so, do it while the room is well ventilated and dispose of the bag after). The simple instructions are half a page. If the issue bothers you that much, get LED lighting.
Hey AC, do you have kids?
Glad they showed those radical socialists in the bush white house a thing or too. With this and their stance on the budget I fear what they will be 4 years from now. How much more extreme can you go?
http://saveie6.com/
More proof that having kids makes people stupid. A good friend of mine turns off the wireless LAN when it's not in use because the radiation might be bad for his kid (not even in the same room). There's no talking with parents. Once the hormones take over, science is about as reputable as a Jehovah's Witness at the door.
I hope you aren't an adult based on your response. (Yes, I am a Dr).
What brand are you using in your bathroom? I've been trying to use a mix of incandencent and CFLs in my light bar. I've tried every CFL brand I could find locally and they all suck. Most of them have had a shorter lifespan the the incandencents that they are right next to. They also take forever to warm up, and their light ouput drops off after about a month.
For the end user the savings may be huge, but not necessarily over the whole process.
If you break it down to the manufacturing of each, the CFL may lose the debate.
Both have a glass enclosure, a screw in base, and some bits of wire.
A CFL has additional solid state components and a circuit board that all need to be manufactured somewhere. The fab that makes the solid state parts uses tremendous amounts of power, and is in no way “green” considering all the process chemicals. Thats a hell of a lot of coal just to make the extra parts.
Considering the extra manufacturing processes involved, the incandescent bulb might not be as evil as everyone thinks. Until there are some definite numbers attached, we really should not be forcing one over the other.
Einstein probably played with it.
Yeah, and he's dead.
Then let other people repopulate the planet for you because you clearly aren't a parent. I'm not an expert in all areas and others here reassured me that the Mercury vapor condensed soon after breakage. I can tell you that the Tx power of wireless LAN is nothing to be concerned about. But the SAR ratings of cellular phones is not something I want my kid putting next to his head for 4 hours a day.
And what makes them "viable" in your mind?
BTW-- if you vote for a party instead of a candidate then you're a moron. Sorry to break it to you but party loyalty is part of our current problems.
I'm glad you are pretty sure. Since a random Slashdotter is "pretty sure" without making any technical arguments, then I should be pretty sure too. That said, I buy the other poster' arguments about the mercury quickly condensing soon after breakage.
Thanks. I didn't realize it condensed right away.
Just the House of Representatives is voting on this.
The Senate won't even consider it. And the news media shouldn't report on it as if it's a possibility, because it's not.
Unless the Senate happens to bring it up.
But they won't.
Thanks, I didn't realize it condensed right away. That definitely reassures me. Now to convince my wife!
I said we shouldn't use the tax code to influence people's behavior.
If not taxes, then what else should a country use to influence people's behavior in order to make defense and infrastructure more feasible?
Energy is an infrastructure issue. Taxing inefficient lighting would provide revenue that the United States could invest in research into how to provide energy and use it efficiently. It also becomes a defense issue when various countries unfriendly to the United States have market power in the energy market (e.g. oil-based vehicle fuel), or when countries unfriendly to the United States consider using energy technologies to make weapons of mass destruction.
Don't EVER feed your son soybeans. Soybeans evolved to fuck up mammals' reproductive systems to discourage mammals grazing on soybeans. Soybeans contain 'phytoestrogens' which have been proven to give your son boobs and turn him gay. Do you know why tofu-eating vegans are so emasculated? It's in the tofu.
Also, avoid plastic water bottles. Those contain phthalates, which also mimic estrogen- "plasticizing" your son's reproductive anatomy and sexual preferences.
An income tax shifts taxpayer behavior away from doing things that result in income. The behavior may shift toward doing things that result in capital gains or the like, or it may shift toward just working less and contributing less to the economy.
There's energy-efficient and cost-efficient. Electric heat is the former but not even remotely the latter.
1kWh is equal to 3,413 BTUs. At $0.1109/hWh, that's 9.0kWh/$, or about 31,000BTU/$.
As of April 11, natural gas cost $11.02/1000ft^3. At 1030BTU/ft^3, that's about 94,000BTU/$.
According to Consumer Reports, a "typical gas furnace made in the early 1970s has an AFUE of about 65 percent.", so your $1 of natural gas would get you about 61,000BTU of heat. Compared to a perfectly efficient electrical heat source, that ancient furnace would be approximately half as expensive to run. Newer furnaces can reach upward of 97% efficient, or about one third the price of electric heat.
Electric heat is only efficient in terms of energy conversion. In terms of wallet-to-warmth conversion, it sucks.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
And in a democracy, the government *is* the people
The United States is not a democracy. In order for a representative legislature to work, elected representatives have to represent all their constituents. But in practice, legislators tend to represent for-profit interests more than not-for-profit interests because for-profit interests help them get elected. For example, legislators represent publishers of non-free copyrighted works more than libraries (or for that matter the rest of the fair use industry) because publishers of non-free copyrighted works own the news media, and without news coverage, a candidate can't get his name out to voters in his district.
a buck or two? try $10-$15. and they use shitty electronics that fail more often than not. even if every incandescent was replaced with cfl, we'd still need a nuclear program.
Dear AC, Thanks for calling me a moron. The GOP candidates around here are all Tea Partiers. I'll change my voting strategy when I see fit. What makes LEDs viable? I would like 1000 lumen output for $50/bulb.
The EPA website's cleanup instructions were vast. They even recommended that all clothing that came in contact with any of the CFL be destroyed. I assumed this also meant the wall-to-wall carpeting in my son's bedroom where he plays.
Umm... The wall-to-wall carpet is clothing?! Remind me not to ask you for fashion advice.
Replies to your question are here.
It's 0% efficient, all of the energy is lost to heat!
Holy shit. I can smell the patchouli and condescension from here.
Who cares.
No one has a right to tell me what I can and cannot buy.
But I have discovered that I can now buy LED bulbs for $7. That's right, $7. But you have to buy them over the Internet, from European distributors such as dealextreme.com. No more bulb changing for me!
Wrong. Electricity can be converted to heat with 100% efficiency, but coal cannot be converted to electricity with 100% efficiency, so the total efficiency of electric heat is low. (There is also some loss of electricity in the power lines.)
On the other hand, natural gas can be converted to heat with fairly high efficiency.
Ha! You obviously don't live in Canada!
Inefficient as in it doesn't work well to actually heat the home.
Not inefficient as in "it doesn't put out a lot of heat".
If you put a propane torch in the far corner of your house, you might be "efficiently" converting fuel to heat (probably not since there's a lot of light coming off too).. but it's not going to efficiently heat the entire house.
Isaac Newton played with mercury all the time. Only ended up becoming the smartest man to ever live. Our kids don't have *enough* mercury if you ask me. I hope you at least took the opportunity to explain to him the three laws of motion.
While it is true that electrical heat converts 100% of the energy delivered to the device into heat. But this is a highly dishonest measurement. Electricity is not an energy source. It is an energy transfer medium. Here in California most of our electrical is generated by gas. Gas is burned to generated heat (losses from incomplete combustion and transfer to the environment), heat is converted to mechanical energy (thermodynamic losses), mechanical energy is converted to electrical energy (more losses), and more still is lost to resistance in the wires that bring the electrical energy to your home.
Compare this to burning the gas directly in your home, which uses all the heat directly rather than wasting much of it via unnecessary conversions.
With a space heater-- which includes a lighting device-- 100% of the energy that makes it to the device is radiated as heat or becomes heat once it strikes an opaque surface.
But far less than 100% of the energy that is converted to electric power will make it to a device. Consider generation losses and transmission losses.
Pretty much all of the KWH that go into an electric heater come out as heat. A gas burner will always lose some up the chimney or whatever.
But how much of the energy that goes into a generator comes out as electric power? And how much of the energy that comes out of the generator ends up at the customer's premises?
The problem is that people are really, really, bad at TCO calculations. If one bulb is $1, costs $0.50/year to operate, and lasts for two years, and one is $0.10, costs $3/year to operate, and lasts for one year, most people will pick the second bulb, because it's cheaper. The free market requires informed consumers, and I've not seen any evidence that such a creature exists.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
There is NO mercury in incandescent bulbs... But the coal used to generate electricity does contain mercury.
I have seen numerous people make the untrue statement that incandescent bulbs contain mercury. They do not. However about 50% of our power still comes from coal - and that does contain mercury (and it is released when power is generated...) But it is not in the bulbs themselves.
Think of it this way - would you rather have a CFL bulb (with mercury) break in your home and be directly exposed to mercury (which is a neurotoxin), or would you rather have it exposed in the environment where it will dissipate greatly so it's concentration in any particular area is minimal? Of course the perfect thing would be a energy source that didn't release anything harmful (in particular, for this post, mercury), and halogen bulbs (think incandescent version 2.0), which saves energy, and doesn't have mercury, either.
Of course all Flourescent bulbs, including CFLs, DO HAVE mercury.
As for LED Bulbs, they don't have mercury but their quality of light is quite poor. Our eyes were designed to receive more than a very limited spectrum of light at a time (read: not natural). They are costly and not great for your eyes. I don't understand why the government didn't give tax breaks or other incentives to adopt halogen bulbs instead. The process would support energy conservation, and allow people to use bulbs that won't catch fire, don't contain dangerous neurotoxins, and emit a higher quality of light (which will help save your eyes from extra strain).
We don't have anyone competent in the government anymore - you know - people who are willing to admit they aren't knowledgeable on a topic - and instead obtain outside input from people in that field - you know - people that know what they are doing. People that have a neutral standpoint (nothing to gain either way) but can provide the pros and cons of changes like this? I mean how hard could it be? When I don't know about something I obtain my opinions after researching both sides of an argument and I come to my own conclusions. I become more knowledgeable in the topic and can defend my opinion well because of it. Haven't we grown beyond having opinions based on either incomplete information or from what our colleagues and friends have said? From what I have seen lately, my opinion is that government officials (at least) have not - how sad!
I think it's time we get these clowns out of congress, before it is too late.
Firstly, the "bulb ban" thing is nonsense, there are incandescents that meet the efficiency standard. Incandescents are not banned, and you don't have to use CFLs.
Second, your kid will breathe more heavy metals in his lifetime from the coal plants that power inefficient bulbs than he will from that one bulb.
It's worthwhile comparing the Lumens/Watt ratio of the best-of-breed in both Halogen-Incandescent and CFL. I'm looking at the ones I can currently buy in my local store, and find the best Halogen is the "Philips Halogen Energy Saver" at 2100 lumens for 105 Watt. The best CFL is about 1200lm for 18W. In general the Halogen bulb uses about 3.3x the energy of the CFL. BUT...
* CFLs fall to about 50% efficiency over their lifetime; Incandescents remain at 99%
* The light quality of the Halogen is vastly better. Think colour-rendering, warmth, no high-frequency flicker. [Also, strobe effect is dangerous for rotating tools]
* Women look prettier under real light; under CFL (even the best of them), skin complexion looks poor; LEDs are usually even worse.
* Electric heating from lamps makes the wasted energy much lower; and the electricity is potentially green (nuclear/renewable). Although this isn't as efficient as gas heating, people turn on/off the lights as they enter/leave each room, but centrally-heat the whole house.
* These figures are for the UK; the lower voltage in the USA favours halogens slightly.
* CFLs are rarely disposed of properly, and if broken, the mercury is quite hazardous, especially to kids.
* The main problem with CFLs is the emitted spectrum, but the bulbs are ugly too; especially in chandeliers etc, which cannot sparkle.
So...the overall merit figure is quite neutral. Personally, I'd rather stick to tungsten-halogen; be good about turning off the lights that I don't use; and buy nuclear energy. Given this, we should let the consumer choose, and tax the actual CO2 emissions (burning things) rather than specific products.
Also, the north is having a problem with the ban on incandescent light bulbs. Did you know that the heat from those things melted the snow from things light light posts and traffic lights? Yeah, LEDs don't. Kind of sucks not knowing who has the green light...
Was the snow hurting the light post? Are incandescents banned from use in traffic lights or street lights? What is your point?
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
What brand are you using in your bathroom? I've been trying to use a mix of incandencent and CFLs in my light bar. I've tried every CFL brand I could find locally and they all suck. Most of them have had a shorter lifespan the the incandencents that they are right next to. They also take forever to warm up, and their light ouput drops off after about a month.
You shouldn't use CFLs in places where you turn the light on and off frequently, especially if it's often on for less than 15 minutes. So bathrooms, closets and the like are not good candidates for CFLs, as such use will dramatically reduce their lifespan. Use one of the newer, more efficient incandescents for those fixtures.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
All other things being equal, I believe people should pay for what they use. People who use energy indirectly use armed services to ensure their access to energy on the global market. So if the public is engaging in activities that create a greater demand for armed services, why not tax such activities to fund the required armed services?
Some caution is certainly in order, but the EPA cleanup instructions are beyond paranoid. Batshit crazy would be a better description. Remove child from room (good idea anyway with broken glass), open window, gently sweep up what you can, sprinkle sulfur over spill and then sweep up again. Then clean normally.
Remember those fever thermometers with mercury that every family had when we were kids? Those had a LOT more mercury in them. They often broke and got no special cleanup at all and there is no plague of nerve damage in our generation, not even for those that played with the mercury.
a buck or two? try $10-$15. and they use shitty electronics that fail more often than not. even if every incandescent was replaced with cfl, we'd still need a nuclear program.
You're lying. They don't cost anywhere near that much unless you're buying very specialized bulbs.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
So you're agreeing with the earlier poster that sales taxes -- which is what the utterly misleadingly-named "fair tax" is -- are regressive, and cause greater harm to the poor and middle class than to the rich?
The view of FairTax proponents is that the combination of a sales tax and an annual deduction is not so regressive, that the annual deduction mitigates the "greater harm to the poor and middle class".
I think you looked at the wrong numbers.
Electric heat via heat loss from a bulb is 100% efficient at heating the space around it because it is *in* it. A central furnace is more like 40-70% efficient at heating a space. (~30% loss to ductwork/pipes plus another 15-35% for inefficient combustion and heat capture in all but the latest model furnaces) Of course a total systems efficiency analysis is more complicated, but because their heat delivery is so proximal to the user the bulb will be competitive, even counting coal-vs-gas CO2 and pollutant distinctions, etc.
If you believe there is loss, where exactly do you think the energy is going? (Hint, there's neither a thermal nor an electrical loss path for the heat coming out of the bulb per se.)
CFLs are a niche technology that was woefully oversold and is now being seriously overused because we didn't have the guts to take other approaches to energy efficiency.
+ substantially greater efficiency in use (reduced when heating isn't undesired)
- early failures for many users negate longer design lifetimes
- higher initial cost
- greater manufacturing impact
- mercury contamination of living spaces
- spontaneous flameouts (seem to be about a 5% phenominon and sometimes start real fires)
- low quality light
Meanwhile, even the coal/gas source-distinction benefit becomes dubious if your furnace is old enough or you live someplace with a longish winter.
If we intend to additionally motivate conservation we should just tax joules consumed/delivered. And please use the proceeds to fund grid improvements and energy research so we have more options in the future. Heck if low-income subsidies are enough of an issue motivating stupid laws like the bulb ban (ahem, efficiency law) or CAFE, then we can give everybody a modest per-person tax credit to balance out on the low end.
Jason.
I just saw an article pointing out an effort in Texas to go around this light bulb efficiency mandate by producing and selling the bulbs within the state.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-adv-texas-light-bulbs-20110710,0,4858840.story
I believe this has merit. This is the same argument to allow medicinal marijuana in California, and avoid firearm controls and taxes in Montana. The federal government is only empowered to regulate commerce among the states, not within them. If the lamps never enter or leave the state then the federal government has no jurisdiction.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
... ...
After much research, I discovered that a CFL has about 4 milligrams of Mercury that is released as a vapor (which is readily absorbed by the body unlike the solid form).
The EPA website's cleanup instructions were vast.
Quote from CFL Mercury myths:
One study looking at long tubular fluorescent bulbs found that over a two week period, only 17 to 40 percent of the mercury in the bulb evaporated. The rest remained stuck in the bulb. Roughly one-third of the mercury that evaporated did so in the first eight hours after the breakage; the rest seeped out slowly over the remainder of the study period.
That works out to 0.2 to 0.48 milligrams in the first eight hours. (Assuming average content of 4mg) So getting your son out of the room with 30 seconds, the amount becomes trivial.
You consider these EPA broken CFL clean-up instructions to be vast? Instructions to cook a turkey can be more complex. It highlights some common sense tips to minimize exposure and handling of the broken bulb, and the off-gassing (I take it) of the mercury vapour from the glass.
Also I can buy a 20w incandescent bulb that meets the standards. Yet it still gives off 20w of light.
A 20 watt incandescent bulb won't give off anywhere near 20 watts of radiant flux in the visible light spectrum. The theoretical best possible luminous efficacy for white light is 250 lumens per watt, and a 20 watt incandescent bulb might put out 5 percent of that.
make that 3-6$ a bulb vs 1$ for a 4 pack, otherwise I agree
Here is what the EPA says about handling a broken CFL: http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup-detailed.html It DOES say what to do with rugs. It DOES NOT say to throw them out. Also, I read it a couple of times but could not seem to find the bit where you need to throw out your clothes. Perhaps you could provide a citation?
The EPA's guidelines are here: http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup-detailed.html
While they're lengthy, it amounts to "air out the room and clean it up without touching the glass." I didn't see anything about destroying your clothes, and it specifically says how to clean the carpet.
4mg of mercury vapor in a whole room is not very much. Just air it out and don't panic.
Too late. Your kid is a retard. And it isn't the mercury. It's the genes he got from his dad.
You are incorrectly assuming that humans are "rational economic actors", or even a close approximation thereof. Sorry.
I assume then that you believe a representative form of government elected by the people to be the wrong way to go about governing. You must be one of those "benevolent dictatorship" types.
I don't see where it says to destroy clothing. It particularly allows you to clean up carpet. http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup-detailed.html
You can make a new son, it's not like it's some rare irreplaceable artifact... unless its mother is dead.
Like saying something is burgundy not red.
Or arguing what the meaning of "is" is.
Yeah incadescent light bulbs aren't banned. Just light bulbs which don't meet certain efficiency standards like most incadescent light bulbs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase-out_of_incandescent_light_bulbs#United_States
After being all CFL in my home for 8 years and trying numerous brands, I can only offer two reasons that may cause problems.
You probably bought cheap bulbs. I've had some from some chinese company know for their budget lighting, Feit Electric. These bulbs or similar bargain bin types will only make it 6 months at best.
Or, you put them outside. CFL bulbs do not do well when exposed to the elements. There's a reason they never caught on as outdoor lighting. If you live in an area that gets cold in the winter, a CFL won't make it past the first snow. I have had one that survived winter, but has barely any light output. I put it in my garage, and it is now on its 4th year. ;) If you do need to put a bulb outside, an Led may work if you're up for it. but you can just use a halogen or other incdescent.
As for the mercury in the bulbs, it's about 1mg. You probably have much more than that in your house or front yard. If you really have a problem with mercury, ban coal plants. Oh, and not just in whatever country you're in...but worldwide. a broken CFL bulb is laughably insignificant compard to burning coal.
I don't think anyone can fault you for getting rid of anything that contains mercury whenever possible. I don't get what you're saying about the EPA cleanup instructions. The long version is here: http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup-detailed.html
It's fairly simple: ventilate, use tape to pick up the tiny bits/powder, seal it all in a plastic bag and remove it from your home as soon as possible.
Where did you get the recommendation to destroy clothing?
You can buy CFLs that contain a plastic barrier around the tube that reduces the chance of breakage and exposure. It shouldn't be too tough to make them with nearly unbreakable glass, so I'm not sure why manufacturers don't offer that.
If you're that worried about developmental damage, you should be focusing most of your energy on volatile organic compounds (VOCs) commonly found in paint, carpet, and just about everything else.
LED are viable now. They're pretty great, actually. Excellent work on taking care of your kid.
- Republican
How many light bulbs are you running that you're noticing a drop in energy used by your air conditioner? No way you're going to notice this unless you put your thermostat right above a light bulb or you're running a truckload of lamps. The amount of energy these things put off as heat is trivial compared to what the sun coming in through the window (or radiated through the walls) will do.
I call bullshit.
A brief search of the Snopes website via Google turns up information that swats the majority of your disinformation: Light Fingered. It includes step-by-step EPA guidelines for cleaning up a broken CFL on either a hard or carpeted surface. At no point in the guidelines does the EPA recommend getting rid of the carpet or even the clothes you were wearing when you were "exposed" to the bulb.
Your son is more at risk from the fish he eats -- and the fish your wife ate while pregnant -- than he is from that incidental exposure.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
Perhaps I was mixing up the guidance found here: http://www.epa.gov/mercury/spills/
I probably got that information here: http://www.epa.gov/mercury/spills/
http://www.energy.ca.gov/lightbulbs/lightbulb_faqs.html
The problem is, how sure are you that this ban/energy efficiency requirement does a better job of managing the externalities than the market? What about the externalities of the manufacture and disposal of the new lightbulbs? You assume that because the market does not make the decision that you think it should, that the market has failed. It is more likely that there are factors that the market has adjusted for that you are unaware of, than that there are factors you are aware of that the market has not accounted for. The reverse is not impossible, just less likely.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Mercury vapor is considerably different than mercury in fish when it comes to absorption by humans...
Many popular 4' and 8' fluorescent tubes will no longer be available after July 2012 due to the new standards. Say you have an older fixture with an F34T12/CW tube for example. If it burns out, you'll have three options. One is to install a new ballast that is compatible with a high efficiency T8 tube. This will result in savings but requires the purchase of a new ballast and disposal of the old one, which has an environmental impact as well. Two, purchase a replacement tube compatible with the existing ballast which produces more lumens per watt but costs more and still uses the same amount of energy (such as an F34T12/841 triphosphor tube). Although more efficient, the additional output will probably not be enough to shut off any tubes without changing the layout of your fixtures. A third option is to buy a bulb that is exempt, such as F34T12/CWX because it meets the color rendition standards even though it is actually less efficient. This may be the cheapest option, but in order to account for the lower output, you'll probably need to use the 40W version, which would circumvent the efforts in the 1990s to reduce the wattage of the most common 4' T12 tubes from 40W to 34W.
How much do you want your government telling you what to do with harmless bulbs and replacing them with environmentally unsafe alternatives?
Are you so much of a helpless baby that you can't make big boy decisions without a big nanny gov't stepping in?
I don't think you are. I think you ought to buy what you want to buy and use as much energy as you want to pay for.
I tried to switch to CFLs and it was nothing but trouble. Flickering, breaking very early (and releasing that terrible smelling smoke), taking forever to turn on, and not being very bright.
Incandescent bulbs waste a lot of energy, but I can't help but think the CFL switch was really necessary given all the mercury and other junk that goes into each bulb. In terms of disposal which one is worse for the environment, which one fills up landfills more? At least regular light bulbs are glass and metal, both of which are recyclable.
I think the bulb ban was the same as the digital TV switch -- something forced on consumers because the industry behind the new technology was able to grease enough palms to force a switch to their product.
I'm all for environmental protection and green energy, but forcing CFLs on people is a heavy-handed method that itself makes for a solution of dubious worth.
How could we make lava lamps work without inefficient incandescent light bulbs?
There are no more incandescent light bulb factories in the US. This is another way to keep jobs in China. Hello Congress. WTF. Let's save energy and save the environment at the same time.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/07/AR2010090706933.html
Thermodynamics says bullshit.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
The EPA website's cleanup instructions were vast. They even recommended that all clothing that came in contact with any of the CFL be destroyed. I assumed this also meant the wall-to-wall carpeting in my son's bedroom where he plays.
You are a liar, an idiot, or both. That you are modded up shows how willing people are to moderate their ideology rather than facts.
Here are the EPA instructions for cleaning up after a broken CFL. Please show me where it says to dispose of clothing, and if you claim a historical version please provide a link to a cached version of that page.
We used to have swordfights with CFL bulbs.
I feel sorry that you somehow made it past your CFL swordfighting days (by hiding inside, no doubt) and have gone on to spread your pussy genes.
the kid is toast.
recycle the little darling before they refuse pickup due to the Hg.
CFL usually are much hotter than 30C. Mercury vapor pressure rises pretty quickly with temperature. Comparing with water makes no sense at all, water is not the dangerous poison that mercury is to children.
And while all the mercury was probably not in vapor phase when the lamp broke, if there was a spill in a carpet there is not chance at all to be able to recover it, and the mercury would poison the air possibly for some time.
LED is better than halogen - you don't irradiate your child with UVB and UVC (and that glass ain't filtering all of it, FYI.)
LED is also much more viable. Keep an eye on the market, it changes every couple months with each new advancement.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
It may be less efficient, but it costs less here to heat your home with electricity than gas... and you have to drive around to get the gas cylinders filled.
If there were value in being more efficient, bulbs would be more efficient.
Econ 101: this does not hold if there are externalities. Excessive energy use leads to pollution (among other things), which is usually a textbook example of a negative externality.
Are you adequate?
Don't speak for everyone and learn to spell. It's "that will" not "thqtwill" moron.
Dear DoctorDickface, you're welcome. I only did it because you are a fucking moron for not leaving the two party system behind. They both fuck you and you keep eating their shit. You're part of the problem.
So fuck you, you dumb fucking asshole. I hope your neighbors remember your blind allegiance as this country collapses and come to your home and take whatever you have left as payment for your complacency in the royal scam.
I'm not saying there aren't diodes with that. I'm saying you try and order a light that goes in a socket with that. Most you find are lower than CFLs. Not a lot lower, but lower. This is one of the few I've seen that is higher.
I hope you never give your son fish to eat then. Eating one fillet of fish is equivalent to breaking about 150 CFLs in his lap.
Not only that, a lot of the mercury in that fish came from burning coal to power incandescent lamps. Sheeesh! Quit the panic already.
Reducing power consumption is a worthwhile goal. But before telling people what light sources they can and cannot use, we should consider the effect those light sources have on human visual development. (“Think of the children!”) I’m surprised I haven’t heard anyone mention the spectral power distributions (SPDs) of light sources in this debate.
You can compare SPDs of some different light sources at, for example, SPD Curves. Select “Update graph” to choose the data series to chart. You can overlay multiple SPD curves for comparison. The curves are all normalized sensibly.
Among the data sets provided there, these light sources seemed closest to daylight in their classes, in arguably decreasing order of daylight approximation:
Nature Studio2 Filtered Daylight [daylight baseline]
Solux 12V Diachroic [tungsten halogen 12 VDC MR16]
LSI LumeLEX 2040-C4M2-6S [LED + cold phosphor fixture]
Philips 50Par30L-WFL40 [tungsten halogen PAR30]
Cooper DL11-WS-WW [multi-die LED fixture]
GE F40W/AD [fluorescent T12]
Pro-Lite Daylight SRI-30W Par 30 [compact fluorescent PAR30]
Compare them and decide which light source you’d choose to supply to a human vision system that evolved under daylight.
The Solux’s (tungsten halogen) SPD looks great, but Solux lamps are only available as 120 VAC PAR and 12 VDC MR16. The LSI’s (LED + cold phosphor) SPD looks good, but it’s a big museum light fixture. The Philips’s (tungsten halogen) SPD looks OK, and tungsten halogen lamps are widely available in a bunch of common form factors. The Cooper’s (LED) SPD looks mediocre, and it’s another exotic lamp form factor. The GE’s (fluorescent) SPD looks bad, and the Pro-Lite’s (compact fluorescent) SPD looks terrible.
In short: tungsten halogen > tungsten > LED > fluorescent.
I wouldn’t be in a hurry to eradicate tungsten lamps. LED and fluorescent lamps have a ways to go before approaching the SPD of tungsten lamps.
We have young children, and I’m concerned about the effect the light sources we use in the house have on their developing visual systems. The human visual system evolved under daylight. It seems reasonable to prefer light sources that more closely approximate the SPD of daylight. So we use tungsten halogen lamps throughout the house. We won’t change over to LED or compact fluorescent lamps until they offer SPDs substantially closer to daylight’s.
When I moved into this apartment a few years ago, I bought a 6-pack of Phillips branded Compact Fluorescent bulbs and replaced most of the incandescent light bulbs. So far none of them have failed (the only bulbs I havent replaced is one in the outside lamp because I almost never use that light and one in the toilet because the fixture is slightly broken and I havent figured out how to get the bulb out without damaging the fixture further.)
And for those who say CF bulbs take longer to start or dont give of enough light, I have a CF in the bathroom and the incandescent in the toilet on the same switch and I cant tell the difference in startup times or light output.
And you happened to miss the bright blue-and-green .jpg on the right side of the page that says, "Learn more about the cleanup and safe disposal of compact fluorescent light bulbs"? You could've saved yourself the replacement cost of a carpet with a little attention to detail.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
The carpet was shot anyways ;-)
Ah, well, in that case, it's all good. :)
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
he Republicans want us to buy less-efficient bulbs so we can waste power on light and A/C
I have a lamp on an end table that probably gets used a half hour a day on average. I finally found a nice 3-way CFL for it last month. It fit the lamp, had a good color temperature, and the 3-way feature mostly worked (it had a good high/low distinction anyhow - I really only need 2-way. $9.97 at the store, but the box said I'd save $112 over the life of the bulb.
My 4-year old knocked the lamp on the floor two weeks after I installed it. He probably got a good whiff of mercury vapor from it.
From now on, CFL's only go on lamps that are fixed and out of reach. I have lots of them all over the house, but I'm going to stock up on incandescents too before they're gone. News flash for Congress: Americans tend to have children. News update: millions of people making financial decisions infinitely outclasses the societal engineering you're failing at.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I don't agree that that is more likely. The market does a terrible job of considering both the long term and externalities. This has been proven, again and again. So the claim that it does a better job is well ... just a bit ludicrous.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
The biggest picture is that the federal government is intruding where they don't belong. AGAIN.
What enumerated power of the constitution did they twist to get away with the original bill again? Probably interstate commerce -- absolutely NOTHING to do with the meaning of that power.
Oh yeah, let's try multiplying the number of CFLs out there by the amount of toxins in them (yeah, the kind that requires a hazmat team to clean up) and then talk about the environment. Glad you saved the Clean Natural Gas from burning, or all that Steam from the Nuclear plant. Yeah, that would have been horrible.
And yes, I know Nuclear has waste. So much that in 100 years Palo Verde would have enough to fill a football field. And they're stored in dry casks on cement pads in the open air. Not quite the horror story I'm sure you've been taught to believe in....
The fact is that how I choose to heat or light MY home should be MY choice - NOT a nanny-state politician's.
While it is true that CFL's DO contain a vapor form of mercury it is a shame that people don't know that when broken the mercury ceases to be a vapor. CFL's are under vacuum and the rapid change in pressure that happens when the tube is broken forces the mercury vapor to condense onto the glass of the tube. This condensation happens in a fraction of a second.
Moral: while all safety precotions should be followed it is the broken glass freshly coated with mercury that is the real hazard.
Maybe they can make every bulb use 500 Watts of incandescent power while they are at it.
Having cars that get 100 mpg and lights that use less than 5 watts each is a matter of national security. Every empire that ever failed did so because they ran out of some resource that they needed to feed their people.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Feynman
I think mr Feynman would like to have a word with you about your UV dangers claim.
The EPA is not paranoid, they're selective. There's a difference. They are probably UNDERSTATING the murcury concerns (They don't mind Murcury as an additive to vaccines? Huh?) Just like any government agency, the EPA is going to selectively enforce their roles to help their friends and punish their enemies. That's how the game works, and that's how compiance is forced. You either play ball and get the gravy train of selectively enforced legislation against your competitors and/pr direct bailouts of your piss poor financial abilities via hapless taxpayers, or you are on the recieving end of regulation, the book thrown at you, fined out of existence to make sure the companies that do what they're told reap the profits.
Oh um . . . What am I saying. . . I love this system., get dem evil capitalists. Yeah. . . that's the ticket.
I hope you're a chiropractor or something. Please be like, Doctor of Philosophy or Doctor of Sports Trivia or Social Science, or some other field of study that is mostly irrelevant. Please don't be a medical doctor...please.
(different AC, btw. same conclusion)
No attempt was made to improve efficiency for decades, until this legislation.
CFL's are dreadful; like incandescents, they break easily, only with that extra added benefit of releasing mercury and UV should you not notice one's been damaged. And the light from them - just horrible.
Solid state lighting is the real winner here, it's widespread adoption is inevitable. Far, far more durable, vibration and impact resistant, much longer-lasting, far more energy efficient, and ever improving color rendering. Operation in low temperatures just improves brightness and efficiency, break one and it's not an environmental hazard, your kids and pet aren't going to cut themselves on the glass shards and be poisoned by mercury released.
All our outdoor and most used bulbs have been replaced with quality solid state LEDs for over a year now, we're never going back.
Nice, cool, UV free light with great color rendering, less eye strain, and a lower electric bill - what's not to love ?
That annoying bulb that's hard to replace ? Slap a solid state bulb in that fixture and forget about it for 15 + years.
More signage, signaling, and parking lot lighting is going solid-state. They cost more, but last far longer, are more reliable, and use way less electricity while burning up less power in the form of waste heat than anything else.
So, yeah, this time a law was enacted because people and industry weren't going to do the intelligent and responsible thing on their own. But feel free to complain about the stupid new law that infringes on your right to make everything more expensive for everybody in the future instead of all the stupid and irresponsible people that complain their right to screw us all over has been taken away.
I live in an area where poor people use light bulbs to heat pump houses and water meter covers. Only in extreme cold, since nearly everyone's pretty well insulated down to around -10 Celsius. A 100W bulb is the cheapest, easiest and probably the safest way to heat a small area and no I don't think it would be fair to force these people to buy a more-expensive heating device. Let the leftists attack me now, we all know that deep under their do-gooder personas they really think the poor are inferior, inept and should be rounded up in prison-like housing projects.
I live in a winter belt. These bulbs cannot be used outside in winter, as the moment the temperature drops to (10F) -10C, they wont start. Also, they don't fit in my refridgerator, or my cooking oven. With a new bulb, you get early enfant mortality. And try and take them back to the store to honor the guarantee--wow. Wow because you buy a package of a dozen, and it is only a few months later that you go to replace bulbs and find your hitting DOA.s When there is an efficient bulb for cold temperatures and one that wont melt in the summer heat, and one that can act as a replacement to the regular bulb, then and only then I might consider. And we can still buy light bulbs as low cost high quality Chinese imports.
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
Good man! Way to protect your son. Most people are not smart enough to do what you did.
Mod parent up...
Mercury in water or mercury in landfill where micro-organisms turn it into an organic compound is much worse than mercury vapor. [[citation needed]]
It appears that the bill failed to pass the house. The final vote was 233 for it 193 against it. Even though it had a simple majority it failed to achieve the two thirds majority required for expedited action. Republicans are expected to try again to pass it shortly but this time requiring only a simple majority.
Time to offend someone
It's sad to see our country crashing down in ruins, and EVERYTHING our president tries to do to stop it is IMMEDIATELY STOMPED ON by his political enemies, the Rebuplican Party. You could also see this as another attempt by rich people (aka Republicans) to make a little more money, a little faster, and to hell with the consequences for the environment or the economy.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2829662/
Those of us that build UV-emitting medical devices know better, and I design lamps from the ground-up.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
That is how you deal with a "large" liquid mercury spill, say from a broken thermometer as the page indicates. That response is overkill for a broken CFL. You can tell that by the direct link on the mercury spill page to the CFL cleanup instructions I provided. It's in bold titled "specific information about how to clean up broken fluorescent bulbs". There is also a pretty picture of a CFL. Clicking on it provides links to other information on CFLs and mercury that contains facts an opposed to FUD.
Throughout history the market has consistently done a better job of prioritizing economic activity than central planning by a margin that is not even close. This has been proven more often than your claim.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Have you actually seen the instructions for proper disposal and cleanup after CFLs break? Or are you accusing EPA and the bulb manufacturers of being paranoid as well?