Europe To Ban Halogen Lightbulbs (theguardian.com)

After nearly 60 years of brightening homes and streets, halogen lightbulbs will finally be banned across Europe on 1 September. From a report: The lights will dim gradually for halogen. Remaining stocks may still be sold, and capsules, linear and low voltage incandescents used in oven lights will be exempted. But a continent-wide switchover to light-emitting diodes (LEDs) is underway that will slash emissions and energy bills, according to industry, campaigners and experts. LEDs consume one-fifth of the energy of halogen bulbs and their phase-out will prevent more than 15m tonnes of carbon emissions a year, an amount equal to Portugal's annual electricity usage. Philips, the lighting manufacturer estimates consumer savings of up to 112 pound ($144) a year from the switchover because LEDs last much longer than halogens and use far less power.

Comments

Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

"UNFAIR! European socialists ban pseudo-conservative light bulbs in favor of longer lasting, more efficient alt-light? Get my tiki torch, I'm upset!"

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

Facebook shouldn't be regulated speech. Our 1st amendment guarantees me free speech. I can say whatever I want with no consequence. The government says I have the right to say what the fuck I want anywhere I want and fuck you if you don't like it.

If I wanted to I could go on Facebook and say "sandy hook was staged. Crisis actors who are all Russian backed to infilitrate our school system and steal our bodily fluids. I know for a fact that sandy hook was fake." Then I can post something saying "I want to kill all monkeys; monkeys are going to die today (\/igger."

The 1st amendment says I can do that. Facebook can't ban me, they have to follow the rules set by the government.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

No, thatâ(TM)s not what the first amendment says. Facebook is not the government, they do as they want.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

All speech is regulated, dipshit. Go back to civics 101 Republican morons. AND you're on the wrong article, Jesus.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

Shove that lightbulb up your ass, you libtard twat.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

The strawman is strong with this one.

Re:Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for the cancer, now I need chemo.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

So I guess I should be allowed to just come into your house and scream whatever sort of bullshit I want at you all day long. Don't call the cops, because they can't infringe my 1st amendment right.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well you can have the 6 foot fluorescents up yours then - WITH the ballast fully charged! Fuck your mother until she looks like Trump's gut, sloppy joe meat.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Clit Boner]

Slashdot is not information, and the editors don't convey real info. The BizX Arabs hired a bunch of apes to push their agendas.

Case in point: the implication of this story is that tungsten filament bulbs are banned in Europe. That is not the case here. This is specifically for high-output bulbs. Halogens are in reality equated with floodlights and car headlights.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[morethanapapercert]

I don't think that is true. IANAL, but as far as I know, there are three major constraints on the hypothetical situation you present.

1) Free Speech does not, and never has, protected someone from the consequences of their free speech. The classic example is shouting fire in a crowded theatre, leading to false calls to the emergency services who respond and possible panic and injury among the other theatre goers. If you stand up and exhort other like-minded people to begin a race war and murder people whose skin or faith doesn't match yours, you may become an accessory to murder before the fact if someone in your chosen audience actually goes through with it.

2) The First Amendment says that the government cannot restrict your speech. It does not say that private individuals or organizations have to listen to you, or to provide a platform from which you can broadcast your opinions. Moreover, any platform or forum that chooses to support or host a certain type of content may also be criminally and civilly liable of that content leads to someone breaking the law.

3) The choice to accept or reject speech on a private platform or forum is also given First Amendment protection. If I host a blog, I can refuse to allow statements I disagree with to appear in my comment section. Telling me I had to keep those comments visible would restrict my free speech.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

Start your own Facebook clone and say whatever you want.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[c6gunner]

Free Speech does not, and never has, protected someone from the consequences of their free speech. The classic example is shouting fire in a crowded theatre, leading to false calls to the emergency services who respond and possible panic and injury among the other theatre goers

I always love the irony of people using this analogy to try and support restriction on free speech. You are obviously completely clueless about the fact that the analogy was first made by a judge in a legal ruling which ended up sending a man to prison for the "crime" of passing out pamphlets opposing the draft.

The ruling was eventually overturned, but not before the defendant (and many like him) spent years in jail for voicing an opinion which is commonplace today. However the result of it being overturned is that, yes, in the united states at least, you CAN yell fire in a crowded theatre. What you can't do is engage in speech which "advocates imminent lawless action", as in you can't tell the theatre goers to burn down the building.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

You can also be arrested for yelling fire in a theater, unrelated to free speech laws. Yes, you can. Moron gummer.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[morethanapapercert]

The analogy of shouting fire in a crowded theatre is not invalidated by it being used in a case which was later overturned. The reason the 1919 Schenck vs The United states was overturned wasn't because the analogy itself was bad. It was overturned because his actions in protesting the draft did not present the "clear and present danger" that the United States government claimed it did. Schenck vs the US and its later overturning is one of the foundation cases of the right of a citizen to be a conscientious objector.

Your disagreement with one of my points also does not invalidate my other points. That, in general, free speech doesn't not exempt you from consequences, nor does it require any to listen to you. It certainly doesn't force others to provide a venue for your speech.

For those who advocate extremism (Muslim, Christian, white, black, it doesn't matter) there are websites where those ideas are welcome. Facebook choosing not to allow such content on their systems does not constitute censorship. Nor should it be considered an attack on those beliefs, though many extremists spend a LOT of time and energy spinning it as part of the overall attack on their beliefs so they can justify their militant position.

An actual attack would be if I were to start advocating that we should go along with their ideas, fire up the concentration and death camps, start executing the people I find objectionable without due process, only to do so NOT to the Jews or the majority of Muslims, but to focus on the white supremacists and Muslim extremists. Lets see if those people in white hoods or brown shirted uniforms still think there is nothing wrong in mass genocide when it is applied to themselves.

For the record, I don't advocate that, and never will. I do, however, advocate that law enforcement be aware of those movements, keep close tabs on them and, if individuals break the law, to arrest them and try them in court. I advocate that such current issues be included in the social or civic studies students cover in school. Those who do not learn from, or even remember history are doomed to repeat it. If we are, as a society, to avoid creating another holocaust or holodomor, we need to teach our children what those were and how they arose. I advocate that, any time such militant and potentially violent people speak out on their views, that it is the simple human and patriotic duty of us moderates to speak out in opposition.

The only thing evil needs to succeed is for good men to do nothing.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless they don't want to bake a fag cake, then it's a Civil Rights violation.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

1) Free Speech does not, and never has, protected someone from the consequences of their free speech.

Actually that's exactly what it's supposed to protect. What the fuck good is it to be free to speak if you're going to get arrested for what you say?

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

In Germany Lawyers call this ~"fleeing into private law" ("Flucht ins Privatrecht"). Basically using companies (and them not having the same duties by law) to do something you cannot do directly.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[c6gunner]

The analogy of shouting fire in a crowded theatre is not invalidated by it being used in a case which was later overturned. The reason the 1919 Schenck vs The United states was overturned wasn't because the analogy itself was bad. It was overturned because his actions in protesting the draft did not present the "clear and present danger" that the United States government claimed it did. Schenck vs the US and its later overturning is one of the foundation cases of the right of a citizen to be a conscientious objector.

You have absolutely no clue what you are talking about. The reason that the analogy is bad is because shouting fire in a crowded theater itself does not "present that kind of clear and present danger". On the contrary, the judge who coined the analogy applied it perfectly; he was concerned that Schenck's speech would create harm to the nation by encouraging others to engage in a criminal act - namely refusing to be drafted (which is still illegal), thereby causing the USA to lose the war. His reasoning was solid, and the analogy was well chosen.

The ruling was overturned by Brandenburg v. Ohio. That case had absolutely nothing to do with "conscientious objectors" so the idea that Schenck's case was overturned because the court found draft-dodging to be ok is just stupid. Rather the court in Brandenburg ruled that government cannot criminalize inflammatory speech unless that speech is "directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action". This is a massively important distinction, and illustrated by Brandenburg itself. The case hinged around a group of white supremacists who, at a rally, made statements about wanting to "get revenge against n**gers and jews". Brandenburg - one of the organizers - was charged for advocating violence, and was sentenced to prison. The Supreme Court found that this was unconstitutional. For a crime to be committed it's not enough to just say "we need to get revenge on those n**gers"; rather you would have to say something akin to "Look, a n**ger! Go get some revenge boys!".

This does not, by the way, mean that all of the actions of the "conscious objectors" are automatically legal. Were you to stand outside of an induction center telling men to turn around, go home, and refuse to be drafted, you could very well be prosecuted. You've gone from abstractly advocating the elimination of the draft to actively encouraging people to immediately break the law. The fact that you (and others like you) continually refuse to acknowledge this distinction does not mean that it isn't real, or important.

Your disagreement with one of my points also does not invalidate my other points.

The rest of your points were sophomoric and not really worth engaging with. I got a laugh out of your misuse of the "fire" analogy and figured I would point it out.

That, in general, free speech doesn't not exempt you from consequences

Again, sophomoric left-wing authoritarian talking point, memorized by the mindless to reinforce their preexisting desires. All of the examples you've provided for this claim hinge on government enforcement, and they are soundly refuted by the case law I've quoted.

If you acknowledged that you were wrong about the legal aspects and then, like many of your fellow authoritarians, moved on to insist that "consequences" could just mean people kicking the shit out of you (#punchanazi) you would be closer truth in the sense that yes, if you say unpopular things you may get punched. But we have laws against that, and the person doing the punching needs to be locked up. It turns out that when you assault (or stalk, threaten, and harass) people whom you don't like, you are not free from the consequences of those actions either.

nor does it require any to listen to you.

No, certainly not. This is the first sane thing you've said. It's pe

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[morethanapapercert]

In this case I was referring not to arrest or censorship, but of being socially shunned, of having websites chose not to give a person a place to air their views.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Millennium]

So you're saying it would be fine for me to come to your favorite sites to preach the beauty of interracial love, complete with vast quantities of multimedia visual aids? Great. Just let me grab some of my buds and fire up the special automated teaching assistants, and we'll get this party started.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

You are confusing the First Amendment - a law that constrains US governments - and the moral principle of Free Speech.

As for consequences, well... If you express an unpopular opinion, and you offend people, then they can punish you, right? Call up your employer and get you fired. Call up your landlord, get you kicked out. Call out your bank, have them close your accounts. Then, when you can't get a job, can't get a house, can't get credit or loans... they tell you "Well, you should have stuck to the popular opinions like ours!"
This was common in the early 20th century South, as part of the Jim Crow laws. I'm so glad you support the oppression of blacks, and gays, and women, and every other group that had to advance their unpopular opinions in order to get what they wanted.

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

You might misunderstand the meaning of "censorship". Censorship occurs when one party is censored. Thus facebook IS engaging in censorship. The fact the first amendment only prevents the government, not private parties, from censorung does not change the meaning of the word "censorship".

Re: Trumpies already outraged.

[Anonymous Coward]

"I can say whatever I want with no consequence."

100% WRONG!!!

But then you are likely just another troll.

And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

How convenient!

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[roc97007]

The price is coming down. Only 18 times as much now.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[scsirob]

Not only that, but despite the touted 30.000 hour life span of LED lights, I have already had to replace several in my house, while the old-fasioned, simple tungsten bulbs keep going, and going, and going.

It's madness.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[skids]

Something may be crummy with your power. Try different brands. Some are more tolerant of bad power than others.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Probably nothing to do with crummy power. Cheapo brand tend to overheat, reducing the lifespan dramatically.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[hawguy]

The price is coming down. Only 18 times as much now.

They are only more expensive if you don't know how to do math (or if someone else pays your power bill).

A 16 pack of Phillips 60W (8.5W actual) LED's costs $25.37 ($1.59 / Bulb) on Amazon.

You can get a 24 pack of incandescent 60W bulbs on eBay for around 75 cents a piece. So that makes the purchase price of LEDs twice has much as incandescents.

But since the LED uses 52 watts less power, if you pay $0.10/KWh for electricity, you'd break even after the first 161 hours of using the bulb.

The incandecent bulb will last around 1100 hours (and you'll have saved around $5.70 in electricity over that time), but the LED will last an average of 10X longer. But even if you only got 1100 hours out of it, you'd still come out ahead. (you can get "long-life" 4000hour incandescent's, but they are much less efficient, putting out about half the light as a standard bulb)

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[x0ra]

A 16 pack of Phillips 60W (8.5W actual) LED's costs $25.37 ($1.59 / Bulb) on Amazon.

Probably some non-dimmable pieces of shit...

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[magarity]

Not only that, but despite the touted 30.000 hour life span of LED lights, I have already had to replace several in my house, while the old-fasioned, simple tungsten bulbs keep going, and going, and going.

It's madness.

Ah, but you see the LEDs really are good for 30K hours; it's just that the power transforming base of the bulb that's gone bad.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[hawguy]

A 16 pack of Phillips 60W (8.5W actual) LED's costs $25.37 ($1.59 / Bulb) on Amazon.

Probably some non-dimmable pieces of shit...

I only have 2 dimmers in my house, so dimmable bulbs really aren't that important to me. But if you want dimmables, feel free to re-do the numbers for dinnable bulbs. Here, I'll do most of the work for you, I found a 6 pack of 9.5W Dimmable Phillips 60W bulbs for $23, or $3.85/each.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Crummy power and transients are converted to heat by rectifiers.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

LED bulbs are dirt cheap. I just bought a three pack of high quality, 5000K temperature, 100-watt replacements for $5. They are rated to last 100,000 hours, which is a hundred times longer than those obsolete, sickly yellow incandescent or halogen bulbs.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

When a tungsten bulb dies, it just stops emitting light. No more energy flowing through it. When an LED bulb dies you'd better hope the LED goes first and not one of the other components... Just do an image search for burnt LED bulb.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Kjella]

Not only that, but despite the touted 30.000 hour life span of LED lights, I have already had to replace several in my house, while the old-fasioned, simple tungsten bulbs keep going, and going, and going.

Well we have a cabin and there we keep the light burning all winter long, it's 8760 hours in a year and they last several years so they're probably not wrong. But unlike the old days the key to economic efficiency is to simply not turn the lights out. It might have been 60W from 5PM to 11PM, today it's 11W running 24x7. That's an advantage I guess? Particularly rapid on/off cycles seems to kill it faster, my buddy has basically said leave the bathroom light on. Any "savings" is more than eaten up by bulb replacements. I'm inclined to agree, particularly the "I'm leaving let's turn the lights off" "Oh wait I forgot let's turn them back on" is a bulb killer. Also here in the fucking cold countries the rest of the energy was not wasted, I guess it's different in places you'd run AC to get rid of it....

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

USD $0.99 for a 15w LED bulb that has not blown out on me in over 6 years.

Entire house cost me $17 to light up with LED.

I spend maybe that much yearly on lighting power costs. Everything else is AC and computers.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[jwhyche]

Not really. I picked up a pack of 3 for $5, led bulbs, from the dollar store 2 years ago. Those bulbs are still going strong.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Ol Olsoc]

Not only that, but despite the touted 30.000 hour life span of LED lights, I have already had to replace several in my house, while the old-fasioned, simple tungsten bulbs keep going, and going, and going.

It's madness.

Get the Pitchforks Ma! One bad LED is too many and is insufferable. God wants us to use incandescents becaus not one has ever failed. Since Incandescents last forever, we'll save infinite money.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[anegg]

I like LEDs. I want to believe in them. But in my house, regular incandescent and halogen lights installed years before are still working. LEDs are running about a 20% failure rate in just a couple of years, and they cost a heck of a lot more, not to mention the hassles over dimmability and finding ones with the right color temperature.

I think we'll get there, but its been a painful and expensive process for me so far (switching from incandescents to LEDs).

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[anegg]

I'm not sure how you determined that they were high quality if you just bought them; the "ratings" on the package aren't worth dog doo. The failure rate for me with LED bulbs has been fairly high (20%). Not to mention that most people don't want 5000K color temperatures for regular household lighting. Finding LED bulbs that have a warm color and and dim as well as incandescents is a chore... and then they fail early.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[c6gunner]

The big problem with the dimable ones is that, iirc, you also have to replace your dimmer switches. That adds expense even if you know how to replace one yourself (the dimmers were like $20+ last time I looked), let alone if you have to call an electrician.

Probably still worth it in the long run for the energy savings, but it does change the equation.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[GNious]

I've been using Energy Saving Bulbs (various sorts) since late 90s, and not had to replace any - I'd suspect you have an electrical issue (brownouts and the like), and might want to have a word with your supplier.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[hawguy]

The big problem with the dimable ones is that, iirc, you also have to replace your dimmer switches. That adds expense even if you know how to replace one yourself (the dimmers were like $20+ last time I looked), let alone if you have to call an electrician.

Probably still worth it in the long run for the energy savings, but it does change the equation.

It's getting hard to find non-LED compatible dimmers these days, but you can buy a cheap LED compatible one for $7:

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Le...

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[93 Escort Wagon]

Not only that, but despite the touted 30.000 hour life span of LED lights, I have already had to replace several in my house, while the old-fasioned, simple tungsten bulbs keep going, and going, and going.

I've yet to have an LED bulb go out, and I started switching over to them in 2011. I know the year because the bulbs were expensive and had a five-year warranty - so I saved the receipt and boxes, and wrote the installation date on the boxes (I finally got rid of the boxes earlier this year).

We did replace the ones over our dining room table recently, but that was because my wife decided she wanted higher-output bulbs there.

I did have CFL bulbs go bad, though... all the bloody time. I think my power may be a bit noisy.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Jesus H Rolle]

Not really. I picked up a pack of 3 for $5, led bulbs, from the dollar store 2 years ago. Those bulbs are still going strong.

That cashier ripped you off.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

You've probably got power problems.

I've had two LED bulbs fail, both within a few weeks of installation. The retailer replaced them, the replacements are still installed.

The others are all working, and I've finally replaced all but a few incandescents that rarely get turned on. I've still got a few CFs hanging on, they'll be replaced with LEDs when they fail.

I used to have a drawer full of spare bulbs. There's no point any more, so I repurposed the drawer.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[RandomFactor]

They're referring to upfront cost of course, as you are are aware.

However it IS common to compare the cheapest bulb you can get when comparing prices, but compare the manufacturer claimed life expectancy improvements from high end bulbs.

The cheap POS LEDs do NOT last 5x longer. I wouldn't even give them 2x.

The higher quality LED bulbs are great, but make the cost analysis closer (and of course 5x is still BS)

And I say this as someone with a handful of incandescent still burning, no remaining CFLs (hated them so much...) and almost entirely LEDs at this point.

LEDs are the better direction but it's not as overwhelming an analysis as it is made out to be. Particularly as they have significantly more efficient incandescents that became available once that sluggish industry realized it was being regulated out of existence and tried to adjust (too late). Comparisons are of course not done against the more efficient incandescent bulbs. LED still wins those comparisons, but the story is again reduced when this is done.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[93 Escort Wagon]

I don't doubt your experience, but it does seem odd. I think my house power is noisy... incandescents never lasted long, and neither did CFLs. But I've had really good luck with LEDs from day one.

I've especially noticed it with 3-way bulbs. Those things never seemed to last more than a month or two in our lamps. About 3 years ago I bit the bullet and bought three 3-ways of the LED persuasion at $20/each - they're still going strong, so they've already paid for themselves even just in terms of what I would've spent on incandescent 3-ways over that same time period.

Actually I did have a couple incandescents last for many years - I'd purchased these special "button" bases which basically clipped the AC waveform so the current in the filament never ran switched direction. The issue with those, though, is that the bulb's light output understandably goes down rather significantly...

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[roc97007]

I was being facetious. The price for LEDs has gone down to the point where I buy only LEDs now for all applications for which an LED solution exists. This includes replacing the few remaining incandescents on my motorcycle. This most especially includes replacing all those horrible CFLs scattered through the house.

But besides the usual benefits, (long life, instant-on (compared to CFLs), low power) there's one I haven't seen mentioned yet: They look nice. I have a few vintage light stands indoors, (inherited from my grandparents) and carriage house - style lights outside, and CFLs always looked idiotic in them. But you can get really nice retro-vintage glass LED bulbs that look good in vintage appliances. And they don't really cost any more than regular LED bulbs.

As far as saving money, I really haven't seen much of a savings from running CFLs since the 1990's, which has led me to conclude that light must be a small percentage of our total power bill. If the price of bulbs is down in the noise, and the difference in the electric bill is also down in the noise, then it really doesn't matter what bulb you buy. At least, as an individual household.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[c6gunner]

Nice. Good to know that the price for those has come down also. A little too late to be useful to me, but good nonetheless.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[markdavis]

>" Not really. I picked up a pack of 3 for $5, led bulbs, from the dollar store 2 years ago. Those bulbs are still going strong."

It really is a "crap shoot". I have a few ancient LED bulbs that are still working fine. I have others I bought from Amazon, with 5 star ratings, and half died within a few months. I have a lot of genuine CREE bulbs, and half of those started flickering and dying in just a few years.... and those were expensive.

I *love* LED bulbs. But I also don't think other bulbs should be "banned". That is just stupid. LED bulbs don't solve ALL problems for ALL situations, and if they are so great, they will naturally take over (like they are doing). Old tech will get less and less popular, harder to find, less in demand, and their prices will go up and up. It doesn't have to be forced down people's throats.... instead, provide education.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[vtcodger]

"I did have CFL bulbs go bad, though... all the bloody time."

CFLs do seem to fail more often than is claimed. I think "they" extrapolated the failure rate for long tube "industrial" bulbs to the curly compact form factor. I suspect that compact FLs run warmer and therefore fail more often than the T8/T12 straight bulbs . I've even had one CFL expire with a loud bang. Blew the curly glass tube off the base.

That said, the CFLs do last a lot longer than incandescents.

I had some bad experiences with early LED bulbs. But nowadays, they seem pretty reliable and are more efficient than CFLs, so I'm slowly switching over to LEDs It'll take a long time as the CFLs only get replaced when they fail -- typically after 4 -8 years of use.

Interesting to me -- the spectrum from "daylight" CFLs and LEDs seem to differ from brand to brand, and often has some "holes". FWIW, if you care, you can improvise a diffraction grating of sorts using a CD and see what the emission spectrum looks like.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[hawguy]

They're referring to upfront cost of course, as you are are aware.

However it IS common to compare the cheapest bulb you can get when comparing prices, but compare the manufacturer claimed life expectancy improvements from high end bulbs.

The cheap POS LEDs do NOT last 5x longer. I wouldn't even give them 2x.

The higher quality LED bulbs are great, but make the cost analysis closer (and of course 5x is still BS)

And I say this as someone with a handful of incandescent still burning, no remaining CFLs (hated them so much...) and almost entirely LEDs at this point.

LEDs are the better direction but it's not as overwhelming an analysis as it is made out to be. Particularly as they have significantly more efficient incandescents that became available once that sluggish industry realized it was being regulated out of existence and tried to adjust (too late). Comparisons are of course not done against the more efficient incandescent bulbs. LED still wins those comparisons, but the story is again reduced when this is done.

I compared the cheapest *incandescent* bulb I could find against name-brand Phllips LED bulbs, which I've used for the past 6 years or so (back when they cost $20+ a bulb). So this wasn't a case of cherrypicking cheap LED's. The cost savings from the lower power consumption is so great that there's no need to skimp on the LED bulb.

I gave my figures, feel free to post your own analysis to show your point, but don't expect a big difference -- an "efficient incandescent" still still uses 43W for a 60W "equivalent", they do have longer life (2000 hours), which will help a bit with the fixed cost, but they cost around $2 for a name-brand bulb, so they're not cheap.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Pretty sure your friend is thinking of CFLs when doing the "limited toggling" thing. Also, the energy is basically wasted. If what you are looking for is heating, it's much more efficient to run an electric heat pump than to use essencially electric resistance heating.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only that, but despite the touted 30.000 hour life span of LED lights, I have already had to replace several in my house, while the old-fasioned, simple tungsten bulbs keep going, and going, and going.

It's madness.

There's your problem. Find one with a 30,000 hour life span instead!

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Paul Carver]

might want to have a word with your supplier

What word would you suggest and what effect do you imagine that word would have?

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Luckyo]

That's the hypothesis. Unfortunately in reality, LEDs don't last anywhere near the advertised numbers, and tend to work poorly in many conditions like too cold or too wet.

This is because unlike halogen and incandescent, the circuitry needed to control the LED is fairly complex, and tends to be the primary failure mode. Additionally if circuit board actually does last something close to advertised time, LEDs tend to become much dimmer towards their end of advertised "lifecycle", to the point where in many applications, it will have to be replaced even if it can be claimed in advertising that it "will still work for many years". Sure it will work for many years, but that work will be below acceptable.

Which is why they are being mandated, instead of allowed to be phased in gradually by market choice. Because they're actually not beneficial to end users as far as market goes, even at this stage. But if you can force their numbers to increase significantly, there's hope that development of more reliable controllers will be funded and carried out eventually, as well as LEDs become more long lasting in terms of maintaining brightness.

The downside of this is that low hanging fruit in those sectors has been long since picked. Progress forward will be costly, so it's not very likely to be carried out without a significant legislative pressure on the supply chain just like there is one on the demand chain. We'll see how that ends up, and how much people will have to pay for illumination in the end.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[hawguy]

That's the hypothesis. Unfortunately in reality, LEDs don't last anywhere near the advertised numbers, and tend to work poorly in many conditions like too cold or too wet.

My oldest LED is 6 years old, in an upstairs hallway light that sees at least a couple hours of use nearly every day (more in the winter than in the summer). So that's over 4000 hours, about 4X the lifetime of a typical incandescent. But for this particular lamp I don't even care about the cost of the bulb or the operating cost, it's the inconvenience of changing it since it's over the stairs and I need to go borrow a telescoping folding ladder from my parents to change it, so it's a major hassle.

My second oldest LED is around 4 years old. It's in an outdoor light fixture that sees around 6 hours of use every night - in temperatures ranging from around 25F in the winter to 90F+ in the summer. So it has around 8000 hours on it now, I'm not sure what it's rated for, but it subjectively "feels" as bright as when I installed it.

I've converted 90% of my house to LED's now, the remaining 10% are CFL's in little used areas of the house that I'm still waiting on them to die.

I've only had 1 LED die so far (plus a couple that were DOA when I installed them). Nearly all of my bulbs are Phillips, I've tried a few other brands, but have been most satisfied with the Phillips bulbs.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

I had one fail after about 3 years, but I think it may have been rated for 8,000 to 10,000 hours. I probably averaged six hours or more a day with it since it was a primarily light (used for reading and such).

It was also dimmable and on a dimmer, so that may have affected it. It still occasionally flickers if power is applied, but mostly stays dark.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Luckyo]

I just want to point out that you ignored every single point I raised, and just gave us a long "my story" post.

This is great on your average mass media discussion board for average joes. But this is supposed to be a site for nerds.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Crashmarik]

Try using an LED bulb as a heating element.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[FormOfActionBanana]

I invested in dimmable LEDs for nearly the entire house. I highly recommend Philips Warmglow product range. The website any-lamp.com has good specs on much of the Philips products, where you can filter by beam angle and color rendering index, etc.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[FormOfActionBanana]

Yes, this. I had bad luck with GE LEDs and great results from Philips.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[FormOfActionBanana]

Oh, and OSRAM lamps are awesome for some special applications.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[FormOfActionBanana]

on/off cycles is what killed incandescent bulbs... the heating/cooling eventually would break the tungsten filament.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[FormOfActionBanana]

I hear you. I outfitted my entire house a few years ago, went through many dud products and incompatible dimmers. There is a website any-lamp.com I am a big fan of, where you can identify products by the CRI and other factors.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[FormOfActionBanana]

I hope you like your blue home.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[hawguy]

I just want to point out that you ignored every single point I raised, and just gave us a long "my story" post.

This is great on your average mass media discussion board for average joes. But this is supposed to be a site for nerds.

I didn't ignore it, I gave anecdotal evidence that you're wrong, which is more evidence than you gave.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[The Grim Reefer]

I didn't ignore it, I gave anecdotal evidence that you're wrong, which is more evidence than you gave.

I've been buying nothing but LED for the last 7 or 8 years now and replacing CFL mostly when they burn out. And it was only in the last 2 years that I've been able to replace some of the halogen bulbs.

I've stopped buying generic no name LEDs as they have all been garbage and lasted barely longer than the incandescent bulbs they replaced.

Even expensive ones are hit or miss in bathrooms, and in some cases they don't have the cooling figured out for the electronics for recessed lighting in a reliable way. Any fixture that requires the bulb be mounted with the threaded end up has a tenancy to overheat the electronics more often. I've had several LED bulbs die before I've had them in for 500 hours. I know they're warrantied, but I never remember where I put the receipts in order to get them replaced, so that's worthless to me.

The failure mode is also more annoying than incandescent bulbs. Those usually just die and you replace them. I have one LED in my office that has been flickering off an on for the last couple of months. It never does it when I'm thinking about it, or have the time to replace it. But it seems to always know when I'm on a call and can't do anything about it. I've also had one catch on fire and another get hot enough to release the magic blue smoke. Something that incandescent bulbs never did.

It would be interesting to know how many house and business fires have been started by faulty LEDs. I never see that factored into the overall cost. Some of the first bulbs I bought were ridiculously expensive. I have several UPS and a lot of surge protectors for electronics. At one point I was seriously thinking about putting in a whole house surge protector because the price of all of those non-incandescent bulbs would be a big hit on the bank account if I needed to replace them all at once due to a spike in the power. I'd also imagine that brown outs are pretty hard on LED bulbs too.

Any how, I'm not advocating incandescent bulbs But LED and CFL certainly have some drawbacks that are worth noting. It's not all unicorns and rainbows.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[gordguide]

As always, the "energy savings" touted by advocates of "Green" lighting assumes that light is the only wanted output of a light source.

The efficiency is based on light-output only, so when (for example) an incandescent is described as only 20% efficient what they mean is 20% of the energy consumed goes to light and another 80% is "wasted" as heat.

But what if you live in a climate that requires supplemental heating? In that case, the 80% is wanted output, and the incandescent is now 100% efficient (assuming the other 20% of light is wanted as well).

Where this comes into play is when (like in the OP summary) "energy savings" are proposed via a banning or switchover to "more efficient" lighting; more efficient in this case meaning more of the energy input goes to light output. What these energy savings never account for is the loss of wanted heat output in some climates or during some seasons. That lost heat must be replaced by the building's heating system, so additional energy is required to make up the shortfall.

If you're in Florida (or Portugal) then the more efficient lighting makes energy-smart sense. But what if you're in the UK (balmy 15C temperatures in August are far from rare; the BBC likes to call this "fresh" weather) or Scandinavia? Now you have cold-weather heating requirements that even an incandescent can provide, with wanted light output, at 100% efficiency.

The only study I know of that took this into account was one done by BC Hydro (Canada) that determined the amount of extra natural gas / electric / wood heat energy would be needed with a switch province-wide from incandescents to CFL bulbs. It was far from a trivial amount.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[ChrisMaple]

Generally, it's not true that thermal cycling is what kills incandescent lights, just ask a manufacturer. The necessary high temperature of operation causes tungsten atoms to be ejected. Either through randomness or manufacturing irregularities one part of the filament becomes narrower than the rest; that place becomes hotter and atoms are ejected faster in a positive feedback manner until it melts or is too weak to hold together.

There were, and maybe still are, 7-segment displays using filaments for the segments. In some applications a segment might cycle on and off every second. If thermal cycling were the dominant failure mode for incandescents, those displays would have had unacceptably short lifespans.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[nukenerd]

The incandecent bulb will last around 1100 hours ..., but the LED will last an average of 10X longer.

Not in my experience. I bought a small LED torch (flashlamp to Americans) and after a few weeks it failed. I thought I was just unlucky so I bought another but after a few weeks that one failed too. You can't change the LED "bulbs" (if that was the fault). I have now gone back to a filament bulb torch that my father-in-law gave me; it is probably 60 years old with low cost bulb changes every few years; it just works.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[nukenerd]

I just bought a three pack of high quality, 5000K temperature, 100-watt replacements for $5. They are rated to last 100,000 hours

You are an advertising script writer's wet dream.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Because I have bought the same ones before. Try using some common sense.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't, I like it the approximate colour of natural daylight white, which is what 5000K-6500K bulbs provide (if you think it's blue, then you need to get your eyes checked and tested for colour blindness). I certainly don't want some horrible, sickly yellow coloured lights that make you feel nauseous and depressed. The only people who would buy those are people who don't know any better regarding the effect of colour temperature not just on visual acuity and accuracy but also on mood. Maybe really old, really nostalgic people who grew up by candlelight too, but there aren't too many of them around any more.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Why? Because I listed the specifications of something I'm using?

Yeah, anybody who is anything but vague and nebulous about the products that they use must be shills...

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

"Genuine" Cree bulbs? You act as though Cree bulbs aren't commonly known to be crap. You also seem to think that price is somehow a magic indicator quality. Certainly nobody could *ever* overprice crappy products...

My entire house is outfitted with LED bulbs, most of which came from the dollar store (I usually get those 3 for $5 deals) and in the past 10 years only two bulbs which were a different brand and _super_ cheap (in price and perceptibly in build quality) have died, and that was after a few years of daily use for 12+ hours per day.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Cederic]

I own multiple LED torches and none of them have ever failed. But I buy solid titanium ones, they probably have higher grade circuitry.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Cederic]

His experience matches mine. I have halogen spotlights in the kitchen that are older than Slashdot and none of them have failed.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[lhaeh]

Problem is that the cheap ones don't last nearly their stated life. Even the expensive ones won't last in some fixtures that are more enclosed.
Those are also the 60W ones that just are not that bright, the 100W equivalents tend to cost 3-4 times as much as the 60W.

As for price, you can get a 4 pack of 100W incandescents at most any dollar stare.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[kenai_alpenglow]

The problem with dimmable LEDs and dimmer switches is (at least at the price point I'm at) they really don't dim the LEDs as low as I'd like at times. The lowest setting before "completely dark" is still too bright. Incandescent bulbs you could dim to a very low glow if you wanted. Having said that, I hate incandescent bulbs. Not for the eco-warrior reasons, I just hate the color of the light and the heat they give off (you can hate inefficiency without going full eco-warrior). And just about every light bulb I have is LED.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[kenai_alpenglow]

I agree with your sentiment (especially as one who has in the past used "incandescence heating" during the winter (I still hated the color, & CFLs where just coming out, even more unreliable than present, and expensive). But for a true comparison, you would need to figure in the efficiency of basically resistance heating vs whatever else you used for heating. In my case it was glowing red coils in the heater or glowing yellow coils in the light bulb :-). And I was keeping the thermostat in the 50s.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Electric heating is expensive compared to the other options available in cold climate. But if you are gonna use electricity for heating, you should consider heat pumps as the more efficient alternative to light bulbs.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[kenai_alpenglow]

I have rather strong glasses. No need for a diffraction grating, just look at the bulb off-center. Especially with LED bulbs (which I otherwise like). Headlights are especially bad, the blue refracts outside the headlight outline, so I'm always seeing "unmarked car Cop Lights" coming at me from behind--at least they're not flashing!). I've got some of those multicolored smart bulbs I play with. I can tell how much R/G/B is showing (the refract on different sides of the bulb) for whatever color they're set at.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

As always, the "energy savings" touted by advocates of "Green" lighting assumes that light is the only wanted output of a light source.

Guess what the primary purpose of a light source is? Could it possibly be to convert energy from another form like electricity into light in the visible spectrum? And wouldn't it make sense to measure efficiency by seeing how much light you get for electrical energy that is used? And everything else that electrical energy would be used on can be seen as a waste product?
No, all those engineers have it totally backwards. Stupid eggheads!
The electronic device you wrote this message on generates heat as a waste product. But probably you think that more energy and computational efficient hardware is "Green" propaganda and still use your Mac Powerbook 180c. And as a bonus it doubles as a heater. Who needs efficient hardware anyway?
I mean sure, if it still works, why not use it until it breaks? I also still use a laptop that is over 10 years old. But if that old piece of tech finally breaks beyond repair, I'm not going to spend money on a replacement that has the same terrible efficiency by today's standards. Well, perhaps if I can get it for free.

The thing with heating is, that there's way more efficient ways than using waste heat from your electronics or light sources. Gas and oil for example have excellent thermal efficiency. Even something as simple as firewood is better suited for heating. And if it must be electricity, because granted, it's super convenient to get that heating 'fuel' from the wall socket, buy something like a storage heater.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Anedoctal evidence is shit, and so are you. I bet you're into kiddie scat bestiality snuff porn too. And you're a German. Go die in a fire, nazi pedo.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

(Iâ(TM)m GP but I donâ(TM)t log in on my phone)

I think you should have a look at the spectrum you get from LEDs. It is basically the Hajia Sofia :)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3948037/

Oh, and lest we lose sight of the bigger picture,
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/29251065/

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting, thank you. Also they wrap the tungsten in little helixes within helixes (like jellyfish tentatacles) in an attempt to recapture a percentage of the ejected tungsten back into another part of the filament. It's a beautiful design to see via microscopy.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, the reason for the double helix is to increase the overall surface area and therefore area emitting light, making the light brighter.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[dfm3]

No, they're only about 2x the cost (for a single bulb) these days. Halogen bulbs are typically those special-purpose, smaller sized, and often expensive bulbs that are used for special applications like range hoods. As a homeowner, I HATE them because they burn out after 1-2 years with typical use, are hard to get to, and cost about $2-10 to replace. The LED alternatives cost about $5-12 a piece for the same style bulb, but have much longer life and don't get as hot.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Many of the LED-compatible dimmers have an adjustment on the switch to control the dimming range. Not visible when the switch is installed. Though sometimes cranking it down can lead to other issues (e.g. flickering)

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Teun]

You start with a bad assumption, the light-efficiency of incandescent bulbs is between 2.5 and 4%, more than 5 times worse then the 20% you suggest.

It's only in places with an abundance of hydro-electricity where it would make economical sense to have electric heating.
In most places on this world other forms of heating are (much) cheaper.
Then think of places with air conditioning where incandescent lamps are a double waste of power!

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Dorianny]

People are resistant to change and that resistance seems to grow with age. Educating my father on how much he would be saving had no effect, when I went ahead and replaced them myself, he nearly had a aneurysm. He got a huge grin when he opened next months electric bill thou.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[that this is not und]

In my vintage collectable Easy Bake Oven?

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

I've seen LEDs go for $0.50 each at dollar tree (2-pack). They aren't as efficient as the $1 LEDs (I think they were 9.5W instead of 8.5W), but there's, imo, no excuse for using incandescents anymore unless you're trying to warm things up. (e.g., if you live in a cold climate then I see no problem with incandescenta)

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[markdavis]

>"People are resistant to change and that resistance seems to grow with age. Educating my father on how much he would be saving had no effect, when I went ahead and replaced them myself, he nearly had a aneurysm. He got a huge grin when he opened next months electric bill thou."

Glad it worked out :) You are right that there are always some people who don't or can't see reason. But that isn't the best argument for removing choice from those who do have good reasons for still using older technology. Freedom does have some fallacy, but the alternative is a nanny state, telling you everything you can or can't do (or just removing choice completely). It it hard to draw lines sometimes, but we need to be careful.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Luckyo]

Well, so much for slashdot being for nerds. "My life story" is apparently "more evidence" than noting the objective problems with the platform.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, nevermind the fact that life on Earth evolved over billions of years under similar lighting conditions.

You're wrong, you just don't want to admit it and that makes you an idiot.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as LED matches natural light, I would not have an issue giving up halogen. The closer LED phosphors get to producing a color temperature curve somewhat like the sun, and thus high color rendition aspects, the worse the efficiency is, the dimmer the LED.

I think this idea is a big change for a small gain. I think there are better power hogs to target, and especially better carbon pollutors to target, in earnest, before this bullshit of telling everyone to do their part... even though it is a tiny bit every bit helps, right? It just isn't good enough... this is not being environmentally conscious, this is instead marketing LEDs trying to play that heart-string.

Making change in how humans effect the environment should start with the most energy and attention applied to a list of the actual identifiable and real and individual worst energy-hog offenders and carbon pollutors. This is near mindless ineffecfive panacea of "switch to LED" is kind of in a way, total bullshit. Sure, LED is more efficient. BUT RESIDENTIAL LIGHTING IS NOT REMOTELY ANYTHING OTHER THAN A NEGLIGIBLE ASPECT TO THE ENERGY/CARBON PROBLEM. More might be saved if Europe required all business to turn off desktop machines every night or when not in use, which is to say, not much.

Europe, and the US and the World, should constantly be identifying the top 10% of all carbon producers and curb or eliminate their carbon production. That would make a difference. Switching to LED might reduce energy use a little bit, but not enough to scratch the surface of the actual cases of atmospheric carbon production, like a ship, or a factory, let alone fleets and entire industries.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[vandamme]

It's not thermal cycling, it's the temperature coefficient of tungsten that causes a surge at turn-on. The inrush current of a cold bulb might be 5-10 times what a hot filament takes. That's why they blow out when you flip them on.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[twosat]

I had an LED bulb in my bedroom light that recently failed a few months shy of 5 years. I was deliberately hard on it, and would turn it off even if I was going out of the room for a few minutes. The replacement bulb is even more efficient, so I am not bothering to turn it off unless I know that I will be gone for quite a while. We have been an all-LED light bulb house for over 3 years now and no other LED light bulb has failed.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Those big LED lamps have heat sinks. Time to direct the heat to the central heating system while enjoying the brighter side of life. And to be careful to not to look up.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[RespekMyAthorati]

I thought I was just unlucky so I bought another but after a few weeks that one failed too

You need to pay for better "torches".
I've been using exclusively LED flashlights for 7 years now and have never had a failure.
And that is with only medium-priced lights.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Jerry Atrick]

Newer led filament bulbs need much less electronics to run since a string of them in the bulb will run directly of mains voltages. Less electronics makes them more dividing as well. They also don't need large ugly heatsinks and should heat stress less. They're getting cheap really fast, mine are long past their payback period and nowhere near their rated life.

It doesn't hurt that they look good as well.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Amen! Best post on the page!

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Jerry Atrick]

"More dividing" -> "more efficient" and I need to stop a: skipping preview, b: trusting swipe text input

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Anecdotes are not evidence. Fact.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Agripa]

They are only more expensive if you don't know how to do math (or if someone else pays your power bill).

And if you include the true reliability instead of the claimed reliability, they again cost more than cheap incandescent lamps. Manufacturers list the LED operating life which has nothing to do with failures of the ballast electronics. I am luck to get more than 6 months out of any bulb which uses an electronic ballast. Even California released a report saying that they massively overestimated the cost savings because failure rates where much higher than the manufacturers specified.

This is just another example of rent seeking.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Luckyo]

Hold on now. "New ones" and "I've had them well past their payback period". Where is the electricity so insanely expensive for those two to not be mutually exclusive?

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're heating with your light bulbs, you're doing it wrong. If you were using the same amount of electric power to run a heat pump, you would get at least twice the thermal output. If you're using inefficient light bulbs in a climate where you're running an AC, you're wasting more than just the heat output of the bulbs.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Your comments are purely your opinion and not based on any evidence. Whereas those of us that have already replaced incandescents with CFL/LED have almost 20 years of evidence to backup our statements. Get your head out of your ass and embrace the future. Just don't waste money on cheap crap off of Alibaba.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Quirkz]

True, but a niche use. Not having dozens of incandescents heating the house during the summer is nice.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Crashmarik]

Yep that's why I switched over as well. The problem though is one size never fits all.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Luckyo]

Which part of my post are you challenging? The fact that LEDs need more electronics? The fact that adding more points of failure results in more failures?

Can't tell from all the preaching and "it works well for me". Which sounds a lot like Jehova's Witness guy knocking at your door.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Eh? I switched over the entire house to Sumbeam 60w equivalent bulbs for only $0.50 a bulb from the dollar store.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Check your wiring, something is off, where the old incandescents would be a little more tolerant of bad connections becase they are just a piece of metal that gets hot, things with actual electronics in them won't be so tolerant. I had this issue with a bathroom fixture, it would kill any CFL you put in it within a month, the reason was a corroded contact, once I remedied it and coated the connection with dielectric grease 10 years ago it has performed just as every other socket in the house.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Have your wiring checked, I had an issue with a bathroom socket that would kill anything that wasn't incandescent within a month, it was a corroded contact on the inside of the wall portion of the fixture, 30 seconds with a wire brush on the dremil and a glob of dielectric grease solved the issue for the last decade.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[Anonymous Coward]

Constantly dying LED or CFL bulbs is pretty much always a house wiring problem, there is a bad contact somewhere that is producing enough transient noise to fry the circuitry in the bulb. Fixing it will also increase the life of all of your electronic devices.

Re:And they only cost 20 times as much

[RockDoctor]

I only have one dimmer switch in the house, and that's laid at the bottom of the electrical tool box since a couple of months after I got married. PI never saw he point of the things, and once the wife decided that she didn't see the point of it either, off it came and into the tool box it went. And stayed.

Re: And they only cost 20 times as much

[RockDoctor]

even if you know how to replace one yourself (the dimmers were like $20+ last time I looked), let alone if you have to call an electrician.

If you need to call an electrician to replace a dimmer switch, then perhaps Slashdot is not the place for you ... ?

Easybake oven just won't work anymore NT

[Anonymous Coward]

nt

Re:Easybake oven just won't work anymore NT

[b0s0z0ku]

Use an IR bulb, which probably qualifies as "special purpose."

Re:Easybake oven just won't work anymore NT

[Anonymous Coward]

i used to have an easy-bake oven

but it was stolen by ants

now i have to buy baked goods instead of making them myself

and they are covered with ants

Re:Easybake oven just won't work anymore NT

[mysidia]

Just search eBay for 100W commercial long-life incandescent A19 E26 medium base or
"Rough Service" bulbs.... plenty of options

Re: Easybake oven just won't work anymore NT

[Anonymous Coward]

Hasbro switched EasyBake Ovens to a dedicated heating element in 2011.

Re:Easybake oven just won't work anymore NT

[Anonymous Coward]

I tried a 1000 Watt suntan bulb once... Only once.

Re:Easybake oven just won't work anymore NT

[DontBeAMoran]

What didn't you like? The taste or the crunch?

Another Trump FAILURE

[Anonymous Coward]

This never happened under Obama"s administration. Freedom of choice is being stripped away one light at a time under Trump's "leadership".

Re: Another Trump FAILURE

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently Obama voters have short memories and cannot locate Europe on a map.

Re: Another Trump FAILURE

[Anonymous Coward]

Trump only supports dictatorship autocratic states, he HATES Europe. Trump considers Europe the enemy and Russia the Ally, lol. In fact he's never once criticized Russia OR Putin, for all his "toughness" lol. #Traitor?

Re: Another Trump FAILURE

[Anonymous Coward]

I seem to recall under the Obama/Killery/Nuland policy:

Fuck the EU
[ https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2014/feb/07/eu-us-diplomat-victoria-nuland-phonecall-leaked-video ]

Re: Another Trump FAILURE

[Anonymous Coward]

In the Soviet UK, Halogen bans EU!

Re: Another Trump FAILURE

[Anonymous Coward]

Even CNN says you're a liar...

Re: Another Trump FAILURE

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the first Trump joke on here that's actually funny

Re:Another Trump FAILURE

[Teun]

With the global CO2 problems this would be the same 'freedom' as driving on the left side 'just because it's freedom of choice'.

EU becoming more efficient

[WillAffleckUW]

Excellent news!

Soon their more efficient, less expensive countries will be able to outcompete the inefficient places that have not moved to low cost green energy and low cost LEDs.

The south can continue to use Kerosene and Whale Oil, of course.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[Anonymous Coward]

south can continue to use Kerosene and Whale Oil, of course.

.

When the Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake ( The Big One ) puts you dozens of feet under water and / or the debris from disintegrated buildings, we in the south will enjoy seeing how you "superior" people in Seattle deal with that challenge.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[Anonymous Coward]

Soon their more efficient, less expensive countries will be able to outcompete the inefficient places that have not moved to low cost green energy and low cost LEDs.

Haha! Good one! Countries who take a month off a year and think 40 hours a week is excessive overtime being competitive. They can't compete with coal smoke belching China right now. More efficiency isn't going to help.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[skids]

Countries that overwork their workforce pay out the back end in health care costs and the market inefficiencies resulting from having a bunch of stressed out sleep deprived yahoos running around doing stupid things.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[b0s0z0ku]

Maybe they're happier and healthier working to live instead of living to work themselves to death like certain Asian and American countries.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[HornWumpus]

Vermin Supreme is on the job.

Whale couch potatoes, fast whale food. Whale oil extracted by liposuction.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[jfdavis668]

The South? Do you mean Italy, Greece and Spain? Or are you referring to South Korea?

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[Anonymous Coward]

The 90's called, you're old and still boring?

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[Anne Thwacks]

I think "The South" means Balham. Doesn't everybody?

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[hawguy]

Countries that overwork their workforce pay out the back end in health care costs and the market inefficiencies resulting from having a bunch of stressed out sleep deprived yahoos running around doing stupid things.

But when they push the cost of healthcare onto that same workforce, the government doesn't care, the workforce only looks at their take-home pay and doesn't realize that their high healthcare costs are in effect a pay cut.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[WillAffleckUW]

When the Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake ( The Big One ) puts you dozens of feet under water and / or the debris from disintegrated buildings, we in the south will enjoy seeing how you "superior" people in Seattle deal with that challenge.

Economic studies show that rich cities rebuild and become even richer after cataclysmic events, whereas low income areas lose after such events.

We'll just rebuild and become even richer.

Science shows that.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[BitterOak]

The south can continue to use Kerosene and Whale Oil, of course.

Hey, I like my whale oil lamp. It provides a nice warm, soft light to read by while I lie in bed at night reading Moby Dick.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[OrangeTide]

I assumed Antarctica, as you can't get more south than that.

Re: EU becoming more efficient

[Anonymous Coward]

Which means the workforce rightfully demands greater compensation from the corporations instead of giving more compensation to the share holders.

Re: EU becoming more efficient

[hawguy]

Which means the workforce rightfully demands greater compensation from the corporations instead of giving more compensation to the share holders.

This is the USA -- generally the workforce is not in a position to "demand" anything. Those that do that have power are already well compensated.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[Anonymous Coward]

The North can Burn Christians, since you do that already.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[Darinbob]

But the nanny state won't let us go whaling anymore!

Re: EU becoming more efficient

[Anonymous Coward]

Its true. Red states should focus on non brown water out of the taps before something advanced like electricity.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[Anonymous Coward]

What about spectrometry? The spectrophotometers I've used illuminate samples with a halogen lamp over the entire visible spectrum as well as much of the IR. Good luck using an LED or a crappy fluorescent light to do that.

Re:EU becoming more efficient

[jrumney]

No, that would be Deep South. South is Battersea.

Which LED bulb ?

[cooldemo]

Which LED bulbs last longer than fluorescent bulbs ?

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Anonymous Coward]

All of them? White LED's have a mean (not max) light emitting on-time of 22 years. (that means 8 hours a day? 66 years of "use")

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Anonymous Coward]

All of them. fluorescent MTBF is 25K hours, while LED is 75K hours.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Anonymous Coward]

And incandescent lights have burned continuosly for over 115 years, that means a wee bit more than 22 years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longest-lasting_light_bulbs

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[scsirob]

Unfortunately these white LED's need a bit of power conversion to run well on 230V AC. So a little converter is built into the base. A converter of dismal quality which fails in two or three years time. LED is fine, converter is broken. Guess what, a whole lot more electronics waste ends up in landfills.

Green Maffia.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[alvinrod]

You do understand the difference between a mean and significant statistical outliers right? Most incandescent bulbs are not rated anywhere near that long (most of the commercial ones were something like 1000 hours when I was still buying them) and the ones that could last that long are vastly different in design than the cheap commercial bulbs that were being sold.

You're comparing an apple cart to a banana plantation.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[CSMoran]

Dude. You're comparing LED "mean lifetime" with "longest-lasting" incandescents. Seriously?

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Fly Swatter]

Filament LEDs show some promise. As a plus many use a glass case instead of plastic.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[grumbel]

Cheap chinese LEDs tend to fail quite frequently, often not making it past a single year. The power supplies that are build into the LED bulbs also like to blow up a lot. That said, cheap chinese Halogen bulbs aren't exactly long lasting either. There is plenty of cheap garbage out there that will go nowhere near the theoretical lifetime.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Aaden42]

Well-made LED's might. Crap that barely passed Q/A and got sold off as seconds, not so much. And that's not even accounting for crappy capacitors in the garbage cap dropper power supplies most of these have. Then they skimp on the cap values, and you get a nice barely perceptible 50 Hz flicker to really improve the experience.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually the converter MTBF is longer than the LED.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[DontBeAMoran]

You're comparing an apple cart to a banana plantation.

Do you want minions? Because that's how you get minions.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Those stats are for the LED components in lab conditions. The power supplies built into LED bulbs last nowhere near that long and when that fails the whole thing becomes electronic waste.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[hawguy]

And incandescent lights have burned continuosly for over 115 years, that means a wee bit more than 22 years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longest-lasting_light_bulbs

It's easy to make in incandescent light bulb that lasts for decades or even centuries -- just run a lower voltage. For example, take an iron bar and run enough current through it to glow red, maybe seal it in an oxygen-free glass bulb...That will give out light for a long long time. Of course, you may be running a few thousand watts of power through it to get a tiny amount of light, but that's the cost of longevity.

A standard 60W incandescent bulb will put out around 850 lumens and last for around 1100 hours. You can get a "long life" variant that is rated to last for 4000 hours.... but it'll only emit around 450 lumens, so is about half as efficient.

If you don't care about efficiency or brightness, you can make an LED last much longer... there's some 20 year old equipment in our electrical room with old red indicators LED's that are still burning after 20 years of 24x7 operation.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Rhipf]

That should be an incandescent bulb has been on that long. I also don't think you would want to do much reading around that bulb (as I recall it is rather dim and has a very yellow hue).

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Fluorescent bulbs were terrible, they never lasted anywhere near the predicted life span. Fluorescent tubes tended to last quite a bit longer and be extremely cheap, but they had issues due to things like coloring and a lot of the older ones had mercury that had to be properly handled, especially if broken.

Re:Which LED bulb ?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have cheap-ass 0.99 LED bulbs that have lasted about 55K hours so far with no signs of dying showing. Not even a single flicker in that entire time of operation. And it uses real SMD LEDs, not crappy tail-through ones.

Re: Which LED bulb ?

[Anonymous Coward]

All my LEDs came with a 10 year warranty, so if they fail I get a free replacement.

Dangerous

[lazarus]

I like the light that Halogen bulbs give off, but they also emit lots of far-ultraviolet radiation and can cause cancer without a UV cover. A friend of mine got cancer of the hand after many years of exposure doing intricate desk work.

The sooner we can get rid of Halogen the better.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting, I did not know about the UV danger.
I don't like them 'cause they run super-hot and need
a porcelain socket to prevent melting / fire hazard.
They're not really more efficient than regular bulbs, too.

CAP === 'typifies'

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but have you thought about the risks of L.E.D. lights?

Here are a few papers:

1) Light-induced retinal damage using different light sources, protocols and rat strains reveals LED phototoxicity.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/...

2) White Light-Emitting Diodes (LEDs) at Domestic Lighting Levels and Retinal Injury in a Rat Model [Environmental Health Perspectives]
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

I like the light that Halogen bulbs give off, but they also emit lots of far-ultraviolet radiation and can cause cancer without a UV cover. A friend of mine got cancer of the hand after many years of exposure doing intricate desk work.

The sooner we can get rid of Halogen the better.

Don't be so quick to condemn Halogen. When you need a color spectrum that Halogen provides, only sunlight is better. Certain UV wavelengths are bad for skin, bad for eyes, even some tints of blue is bad and literally blinds, causes permanent eye damage. These wavelengths also come with sunlight, apparently. The color spectrum of LED is drastically different, usually shifted to the blue and cool end, and there is more blue than any other color... the UV might taper off, but if it is white LED, its brightness comes from blue, and most commonly, the very blue that causes eye damage leading to blindness.

The major point here is Halogen (and incandescent in general) is not necessarily bad, and LED can be worse. LED is commercially still kind of new and we are actually already bumping up against theoretical max efficiency of LED by 2020. Incandescent is lagging behind in efficiency, but theoretically and most likely, eventually... maybe in 50 years or less... incandescent lighting technology efficiency will surpass LED efficiency. But LED will always be cheap.

What turns out not to be cheap is to create artificial light that is natural, like the sun, which LED won't do (and the closer it gets the worse its efficiency becomes). Bulbs aren't that expensive, just compared to LED they are. How much is natural light worth to you? What are the long term effects of exposure to LED light (and its less than ideal color spectrum)? Looks like Europe is going to find out, hoping for the best.

So the major problem with your argument, "Halogen is bad because of UV and that causes cancer" is that though it is true Halogen light creates UV, ultraviolet can't go through glass, and since most bulbs are made of glass specifically doped to block UV, your argument (presumably promoting LED) that "Halogen is bad because of UV" turns out to be a straw man argument (UV [i]is[/i] bad, though Halogen does produce UV, it is surrounded (generally, some bulbs are not doped) by UV blocking glass).

Halogen is bad because we created the carbon/energy crisis (human industry polluted the carbon leading to climate change, and humans are energy hogs) and decent lighting takes energy. Fun fact, turns out how good anyone feels can be directly correlated to how much sunlight (or an identical color spectrum light, or one close enough, such as an ordinary Halogen) gets in their eyes.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but have you thought about the risks of L.E.D. lights?

Here are a few papers:

1) Light-induced retinal damage using different light sources, protocols and rat strains reveals LED phototoxicity. https://www.sciencedirect.com/...

2) White Light-Emitting Diodes (LEDs) at Domestic Lighting Levels and Retinal Injury in a Rat Model [Environmental Health Perspectives] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

I hear that this new "fire" thing is dangerous. Have there been any studies on the dangers on having a personal fire inside caves?

Re:Dangerous

[Rhipf]

So the major problem with your argument, "Halogen is bad because of UV and that causes cancer" is that though it is true Halogen light creates UV, ultraviolet can't go through glass, and since most bulbs are made of glass specifically doped to block UV, your argument (presumably promoting LED) that "Halogen is bad because of UV" turns out to be a straw man argument (UV [i]is[/i] bad, though Halogen does produce UV, it is surrounded (generally, some bulbs are not doped) by UV blocking glass).

You realize the article you posted doesn't say anything concrete about glass blocking UV (only passingly talks about UV and glass at all)? The fact is that only UVB is blocked by glass. UVA can pass through glass but a UVA blocker coating can handle that.

Re:Dangerous

[hawguy]

Interesting, I did not know about the UV danger.
I don't like them 'cause they run super-hot and need
a porcelain socket to prevent melting / fire hazard.
They're not really more efficient than regular bulbs, too.

CAP === 'typifies'

Capsule Halogens (that are bulit into a standard bulb formfactor) don't run any hotter than a standard bulb -- a 100W bulb can only put out 100W of heat, the halogen is more efficient so it puts out a little less heat. Yes, that capsule within the bulb gets very hot - hundreds of degrees.... but any incandescent filiament hits thousands of degrees, so it's not just the temperature that heats the base, it's the amount of energy dissipated.

So yes, a 500W halogen lamp gets very hot... but so would a 500W incandescent bulb (or even a 500W (real-power) LED)

Efficient halogens tend to be around 20% more efficient than standard incandescents, and last longer. Not sure if you consider 20% to be "really more efficient" or not.

Re:Dangerous

[serviscope_minor]

I like the light that Halogen bulbs give off,

What I particularly iss is the way they go redder as they dim, which I really liked in the evening, and they tend to dim further than LEDs [*]. On the other hand the halogen spots (large nuber of bulbs) always had one or two out because they went so often compared to the LEDs.

I have very few incandescents left.

[*] LEDs theselves are obviously very dimable but the practical combination of 240V LED modules and standard light switch dimmers are not so good.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you read the part about Trinity? You think that might have given off immeasurable amounts of all UV? Feynman was 27, and he did not die of skin cancer thanks to windshield glass, specifically doped for UV. You know what else is doped for UV? The glass in a Halogen glass bulb that contains the Halogen gas and tungsten filament... yup, also doped for UV. Thus, UV is a straw man in GP's argument... it sure is bad and halogen lamps can produce it.... except they don't because they are encased in UV-doping glass, so no one is really complaining about it except on a slow news day at nyt. UV from halogen lamps is one of those things... like coffee (Bad for you! No, its really good for you!)... and flossing (floss or you will get cavities... but flossing doesn't really make any difference).

Halogen is really only "bad" because we are energy hogs and can't keep burning carbon to produce it because we already fucked up the global climate. How many more reasons do we need to make up to market LED? Oh, one more thing, that light everyone has used since they were invented... its bad for you so switch to LED.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

So, if there's an EMP strike, will LED bulbs survive? Or will everyone be in the dark?

Re: Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

All halogen lightbulbs have UV shield.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know about that, I do know that being near a halogen light makes my eyes hurt so bad that I'm tempted to scoop my own eyeballs out with a rusty spoon as that would be less painful than the light. And that's not even staring at the bulb, that's being a few feet away from a light that's got the typical lampshade on it. I can only imagine how much it would hurt staring at one of those things.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

If there is an EMP strike, you'll probably have no power, no clean water, suffer from radiation sickness, and prepare for a slow and agonizing death. If you're into prepping, you're advised to store a few candles, though.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, yes. So you would like your friend now to also get damaged eyes, retinas and sleep problems because LEDs do not create anywhere near natural distribution of wavelengths. Shows just how much of a good friend you are.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

The major point here is Halogen (and incandescent in general) is not necessarily bad, and LED can be worse. LED is commercially still kind of new and we are actually already bumping up against theoretical max efficiency of LED by 2020. Incandescent is lagging behind in efficiency, but theoretically and most likely, eventually... maybe in 50 years or less... incandescent lighting technology efficiency will surpass LED efficiency. But LED will always be cheap.

Incandescent lighting is literally a hot wire. It's pretty damned cheap (for the bulb) and there is no efficiency to be gained. Not in 50 years of research no one is doing, not ever.

Re:Dangerous

[hankwang]

"eventually... maybe in 50 years or less... incandescent lighting technology efficiency will surpass LED efficiency. But LED will always be cheap."

Uhm, what? Are you trolling? For incandescent to become substantially more efficient, the temperature of the filament hs to go up, to, say 5800 K, from the present 2900 K. There is no material that withstands such temperatures.

Re:Dangerous

[FormOfActionBanana]

Philips Warmglow, my friend...

Re:Dangerous

[DCFusor]

OP is correct, and sometimes nothing but good broadband "flat" spectrum will do. I'm off the grid, and started at a time when anything that saved energy was worth it compared to $6/watt solar panels. Then and now (and still off grid) I keep a few halogens around in the lab/shop for when I really want to examine something carefully. Even once CCFL's got to a pretty good point, their main use was as a few narrow lines (you could see in any diffraction grating - or a CD) - and sometimes that wasn't stupid, but...
Initial LEDs were even worse, with that too-high color temperature from short wave LEDs with some phosphors trying to restore a decent spectrum. I wasted endless money on those for my off grid homestead. Now all in a cabinet, the ones that didn't go bad...and a few old CCFLs that have *better* color renditions than the older leds.
Now they are passing/OK, and I use mostly all leds. But I stocked up on various incandescents as they are still for example superior "self healing fuses" with that 10::1 hot to cold resistance ratio and make good series protectors, far better than any other solid state device - with a free indication that they're working. I also use them as elements in pirani vacuum gages. Now, anyone who wants things like that to cost $70 instead of 70 cents...raise your hand now! It'll come back to you in other bills you pay if hackers can't get cheap devices with unique characteristics...

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

The major point here is Halogen (and incandescent in general) is not necessarily bad, and LED can be worse. LED is commercially still kind of new and we are actually already bumping up against theoretical max efficiency of LED by 2020. Incandescent is lagging behind in efficiency, but theoretically and most likely, eventually... maybe in 50 years or less... incandescent lighting technology efficiency will surpass LED efficiency

This is literally impossible due to how incandescent lights function on a fundamental level. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black-body_radiation

For that matter, white LEDS produce their light via fluorescence. - That is the LED element itself emits a light (Typically a higher wavelength blue) that in turn excites a phosphor. Similar to a conventional fluorescent light. (They instead use high voltage to excite mercury vapor to create UV, which then excites a phosphor)

LED makers can tweak the composition of the phosphor to tune the light output to whatever is needed for a particular application. Emitter and phosphor technology continues to improve at an astonishing rate. Better color spectrum. Lest wasted energy. Lower costs. Cheap dollar store warm white LED lights have warmer color temperature than any incandescent light available to consumers. They're also greater than 10 times more efficient than their indandecnt counterparts and last for years.

Professional LED lights have already displaced their indandencent counterparts in all but a few specialist and scientific applications. They're lighter, less dangerous, more flexible, more durable, and consume much less power. You can create a device with an accurate color temperature that you can change on demand! (Uses a mix of warm and cool emitters that can mix their output on demand)

Re:Dangerous

[serviscope_minor]

Philips Warmglow, my friend...

You just made my day!!

Seriously thanks, I am going to go and get some of these.

Re:Dangerous

[ChrisMaple]

There are 2 theoretical approaches that would allow higher efficiencies for incandescents. The first is the use of a material that is not a black body radiator, a material that radiates well in the visual band but not in IR. The likelihood is that no such material exists that is usable at high temperatures. The second is reflecting IR back to the filament, so that a high filament temperature can be maintained with less electrical input. Such lights have been made, but the gain in efficiency isn't much because filaments are small so it's difficult to aim a substantial portion of the IR back at the filament.

The best LEDs are already converting more than 50% of electrical energy to visible light. Incandescents run about 5%, and I don't think they're going to catch up in 50 years or ever.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

We use halogens for heating.
Our city has a sports centre, and in winter, we have to heat the building and the 2 x 50 meter swimming pools. Halogens help with building heat.

In summer, daylight begins at 4am and ends at 9:30pm We hardly use the lights.

In winter, daylight begins at 7am and ends at 4pm, and the temperature outside is -20F
Thats when we benefit from the lights.

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

MIT is working on one approach

Re:Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not certain your premise is true, and besides, Tungsten laughs at your 5800K ! LED is theoreticallly limited in efficiency. We are close to theoretical limits already. LED can not go much further, in regards to efficiency. Incandescent lighting has no such theoretical limit, just practical ones. Over time, research and development of technilogical advances overcome practical limits. Consider that there has been more advancement in medicine in the last five years than all of previous history combined. The same statement is likely true of incandescent technology, sampled at any point in history since its development. It is not even remotely novel to suggest that incandescent efficiency will improve, and more, will ultimately surpass the efficiency of LED. The trick will not be to make incandescent more efficient than LED... but instead to somehow make it cheap.

Backfire

[Anonymous Coward]

This won't save any electricity. This will give people an incentive to just produce more light in and around their homes and businesses.

Humans rarely use new cost saving technology to save money. They use it to produce more of something that felt restricted by the old technology.

Re:Backfire

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no cost savings.

Average cost saving of $144 per home x 10 million homes = a loss of $1.4 Billion in revenue for the electricity generating companies. So they will need to raise their rates.

Re:Backfire

[DontBeAMoran]

energy savings != monetary savings

Re:Backfire

[spacec0w]

I've heard the point you're referring to before and generally I've agreed with it (take driving "green" cars for example). But with lighting? That doesn't make a lot of sense. You just screw in an LED bulb when the old incandescent or halogen has burned out. There's no reason people would go around adding more lamps and such. In commercial uses thought to some extent I could see this happen, but in the residential case, which I think these types of policies are aimed at, it certainly will have a big impact.

Re:Backfire

[asackett]

energy savings != monetary savings

It does if you're a taxpayer. Responding to forest fires, floods, disease outbreaks, et cetera costs money.

Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[sarren1901]

Sorry but everyone time I hear that my energy bill will go down due to increases in efficiency just means they increase the rate. I'm all for newer, more efficient technologies but don't try and sell it like I'll spend less money on electricity.

I realize this is taking place in Europe, so perhaps their utilities are socialized and those utility services aren't by for-profits. I do know people work there and none of them will be likely to see a pay cut due to less energy being used, but the company will definitely have lower revenue.

Here in the states, every time we are told to save save save and we do it, the bill rates always get jacked up because the utilities start going broke when we become more mindful of our energy usage. Nothing worse as a consumer to use less of something, possibly at an inconvenience to oneself, and get charged as much or more when it's a metered service.

At the same time, the local energy company does need to make money otherwise the workers get laid off and the plant may close and electricity will definitely go up in price at that point due to there being less generated.

Still, no one is going to save money but it's great we are using less energy and leaving a smaller carbon footprint.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

A friend complains about exactly this. They upgraded the AC, better doors, new water heaters, fridge, dryer... Bill seems to stay almost exactly the same. Worse, we were in a drought so the water company asked everyone to conserve. We did. Our reward was a conservation surcharge since they were not selling enough water. Oddly, drought is over, surcharge remains. Shocking.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

I live in the US in a State with public electricity. Being public they are required by law to be transparent. They have said what we pay monthly will *not* go down per month. What they have said is most of their costs are fixed, so they are shifting to a higher fixed rate with usage being less of a consideration (it's still a part of it, but say 75% of a home's electrical monthly cost was usage, and 25% is fixed, those will be reversed, 75% fixed and 25% usage). Will this encourage more usage since it's not going to affect the monthly bill? I don't know, I don't plan to change my families habits.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

so perhaps their utilities are socialized and those utility services aren't by for-profits.

No, they are incorporated into distribution and production companies, and the electricity is increasingly traded in the special electricity stock exchanges, with a derivative market. Even the NYSE is involved right here in the EU of Europe. The reasons why the bills don't go down are numerous. Switch to renewables, shutdown of old production capacity, market speculation, excess consumption (miners for an US example), increase in distribution system costs (storm damage, technology transitions, redundancy), fossil fuel markets, and so on.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

You forgot to upgrade your social-economic and your political systems. Do that and the bills should drop :-)

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

Reactionaries want you to downgrade to 1930s socialism. Kick them right in the teeth.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

Faggot you couldn't even kick Marlboro lights, what makes you think your bitch turkey-white flab wing is going to get anything except chopped off and put in a 55 gallon drum, you retarded treasonous nazi pussy-ass faggot bitch lol?

Your sister's calling, time to fuck Cletus. Git.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

And Some how you Think if you stayed with the Old ieeficient Bulbs you rates would not have gone up?

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

Meh. You forget that raising the price of energy is probably the most effective way to address global warming.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

?? Let's assume everything you say is true.

Consumption goes down.
Electric rates goes up.
If you install high efficiency bulbs, your bill stays the same.

But if you DON'T use high efficiency bulbs, you use as much as ever and with the higher rates you pay more than before. So get with the program and do what you're told.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Darinbob]

You need utility regulation. In the past a utility's profits depended upon how much electricity everyone used, so no incentive to get better. Now the state PUCs can put a fixed amount on how much utilities can charge so if they can be more efficient than that then they can pocket all the profits. This then led the push to make the meters more accurate, do more frequent reading and monitoring to be sure power delivery is working correctly and efficiently, etc. This also means that when they blow up a neighborhood or burn down half a city that the civil penalties are not passed along to the consumers. Not hypothetical situations. Of course, you got to be vigilant that they don't get cozy with the PUC and try to get exemptions.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Darinbob]

Why do you put up with it? Tell your politicians to fix it. In many states, utilities have to ask permission before raising rates.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Darinbob]

It is true that the infrastructure is a very large cost that historically wasn't represented in the customers' bills. However utilities will try to overinflate this. You don't want to get to the point where someone not using any electricity has as big a bill as someone hiding a pot grow farm in the basement.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

no different than the 'fuel surcharges' that freight, delivery and even garbage haulers started charging as far back at '91 due to high fuel prices.. guess what? fuel prices have been mostly stable in the u.s. for a long fucking time... and below the retail peak pricing that spurred the surcharges in the first place... surcharges remain anyway... and even increases regularly (ahem... advanced disposal... those fucking crooks)

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[jareth-0205]

Sorry but everyone time I hear that my energy bill will go down due to increases in efficiency just means they increase the rate. I'm all for newer, more efficient technologies but don't try and sell it like I'll spend less money on electricity.

I think the problem is that human behaviour tends to take advantage of changes in efficiency to improve quality of life rather than continue the same and safe money. I know that when I was a child every room had multiple 100W bulbs, we switched the lights off religiously when leaving the space and got chastised when we didn't. Now my house has a collection of 6W bulbs and I don't worry about switching the lights off particularly... I'm getting a nicer evening environment with the new efficient technology by burning up the saving.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

> Tell your politicians to fix it.

OK, I LOL'd! :-D

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Anonymous Coward]

CONFIRMED: 20 years of utility bills on hand here...
My electric use has dropped about 60% when I went from incandescent to LED (I tend to leave lights on).
In the years since the cutover, my electic bill has gone up about 18% from just before the drop.
As far as the amount you pay goes, yes, it's all a scam.

The *only* benefits are more profits for the electric companies, and less emissions.
There's no real benefit for you unless you're a shareholder, or like the Earth and humanity.

Anyway, I now mine decentralized cryptocurrencies at home on a mix of solar and grid power.
Uses far less than the entire banking / govt regulation sectors involved in fiat do.
So I'm very happy with this plan, and it heats my house and greenhouse in the winter, and hot water year round for free :)

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Carewolf]

The Paris agreement essentially necessitates a reduction in used power (unless they do an expensive conversion to nuclear energy), so drastically reducing how much power by power companies is sold is already the plan, the hard part is getting consumers and businesses to save power, which is especially hampered by the fact that of the two politicians are STILL focusing on the lesser power consumer, the consumers.

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[kimvette]

Here no one runs pot grows in their basements to "hide" them but they're usually in the basement because it is a convenient use of unfinished space to put the grow tent there rather than in the living room or bedrooms. :D

Re:Reduced energy usage but not bills...

[Darinbob]

People have used entire houses to grow pot. I've gotten some lovely pictures from PG&E from when they went out to investigate unusual power consumption at a house, and every room was filled with plants, lamps, and fans in a fire marshal's worst nightmare. They wired past the meter. Oh, a nice suburban house too (it's possible it was a forcelosed house still owned by the bank).

"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[roc97007]

I suspect halogens will also still be allowed in "hard use" instances, like the lights very high up on towers in harsh weather.

Just coincidentally, I'm in the process of switching from those damned CFLs to LEDs. I say "damned" because although they initially met the promise of long life [1], later "value engineered" bulbs didn't last any longer, in my experience, than the incandescents they replaced. I'm really hoping LEDs don't fall to the same process -- value engineered to a pale shadow of their original glory.

I always felt that CFLs were a stopgap solution until we found a practical low power light bulb. It appears that LED is that solution, but it may be too early to tell.

[1]. It so happens, of the four original CFLs I bought in the 1990's, the last one -- the back porch light, stopped working last night. And will be replaced with an LED. During that time, I've had many many CFLs fail, some in the space of only a few months. In quantity, they really weren't manufactured very well.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you also notice that the CFLs dim significantly over time as well
(and sometimes take a long time to actually start)? I use CFL for
outside ('cause if the break, the mercury is not in my home) and when
the temperature dips, they take a long time to warm up. LEDs, no such
issue...

CAP === 'occupied'

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[roc97007]

Did you also notice that the CFLs dim significantly over time as well
(and sometimes take a long time to actually start)? I use CFL for
outside ('cause if the break, the mercury is not in my home) and when
the temperature dips, they take a long time to warm up. LEDs, no such
issue...

CAP === 'occupied'

Yes, I did discover all of that. I had misgivings about CFLs from the start because of the reasons you state (including mercury -- yeah, I know they only contain as much as a thermometer, but who keeps 40 thermometers in their home?) but sort-of threw myself into the fervor when they started to become available in the nineties. Because hey, I'm a geek, and they were kinda geeky at the time. By the early thousands I was sick to death of them and hoping for a replacement soon.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[Rhipf]

A typical CFL lights has about 4mg of mercury (Hg).
A typical thermometer has about 500mg Hg.

Unless you are breaking A LOT of CFLs inside the amount of mercury is negligible. Removing that small amount of mercury from the environment does have a net cumulative effect though (i.e. the total amount of Hg in all CFLs isn't negligible).

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[serviscope_minor]

I suspect halogens will also still be allowed in "hard use" instances, like the lights very high up on towers in harsh weather.

Wouldn't they be more likely to use high pressure sodium lamps there? High powered, more efficient than all but the best LEDs and very long life in harsh conditions. Maybe metal halide if better colour is needed.

I'm really hoping LEDs don't fall to the same process -- value engineered to a pale shadow of their original glory.

They mostly will, especially for those targeted at consumers. You might be able to get better, more expensive ones from outlets which mainly do B2B.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[Anonymous Coward]

So those four cfls lasted you thirthy years.
I highly doubt four leds will last you that long. either the leds will burn out, or the integrated power supplies will fail, or both.

passphrase : minima

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[AmiMoJo]

Sodium is being replaced by LED now. As well as being me efficient it offers a choice of colour for different needs.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[Anonymous Coward]

The light-emitting component of the bulb is going to last much longer than the other components of the bulb which are required for the power conversion, and the cheaper the bulb, the lower quality those components are likely to be.

Remember how floppy disks completely went to poop in the mid nineties as a couple of manufactures took over production for just about all of them through cost cutting measures? They were no longer stiff but flexible instead, and we soon saw floppies failing regularly along with floppy drives starting to eat floppies.

Same thing will happen to LEDs. Quality is always sacrificed for profit, and the promise of engineering breakthroughs is left rotting in the dirt.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[Anonymous Coward]

About 4 years ago I replaced all the incandescent bulbs in my house with LEDs. Half the house was done with a cheap Chinese brand (marketed as Clik! or something like that) and the rest with Phillips. I haven't lost a single Phillips bulb, and they are as bright as ever. I have lost about 5 of the cheapies. Overall, the LEDs are saving me a heap of money, but I regret going cheap on the initial investment.

And you are right about the CFLs. I was never a fan.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[roc97007]

Ok, but I wasn't even talking about breakage in the house. In 30 years I haven't broken a single CFL, so the hue and cry of mercury hazards in the home have been largely overblown in my experience.

I think the real issue is mercury in the landfill. Now, I know, you're supposed to recycle CFLs, not throw them in the trash, and I'm sure that us highly educated and ethical people are all doing that [1]. But what do you think Ma and Pa Kettle are doing with theirs?

[1]. Actually, our recycling center won't take them. Every six months or so there will be a "hazardous waste" drive in our area, that'll take fluorescent bulbs and CFLs, but who actually does that?

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[roc97007]

So those four cfls lasted you thirthy years.
I highly doubt four leds will last you that long. either the leds will burn out, or the integrated power supplies will fail, or both.

passphrase : minima

Yes they did. It was truly remarkable.

As to whether LEDs will last that long, we'll see. I suspect that the first batch of LEDs I've bought will have an exceptional lifespan. The bulbs I buy later, say, in those Costco blister packs, won't last any longer than incandescent bulbs did. But again, we'll see.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[serviscope_minor]

Sodium is being replaced by LED now

That was specifically about in hard use areas. HPS lamps need a ballast which is always going to be much more rugged than a power converter.

I've seen HPS being replaced by LEDs for streetlighting, and I am a little skeptical for now. Those high power lamps are among the most efficient already (150 lm/W), which is at the top end for LEDs, and have a long practical life (25,000 hours). LEDs themselves have a long life of course, but the power converters are another matter.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[Anonymous Coward]

The bulbs I buy later, say, in those Costco blister packs, won't last any longer than incandescent bulbs did. But again, we'll see.

I asked a similar question awhile back and was told that the better brand names last, while the cheap ones like home depot Cree? or something like that tend not to. I think Phillips were listed as lasting.

I'd rather have warmer colors, which is actually one thing nice about halogen. I also want the light to be straight down, so you minimize glare on things like computer monitors and televisions and such. In general, I just like how can lights do a better job at that, though I hate that they tend to reduce building efficiency. I think simply using IC rated lights, and sealing with fire caulk and the metal tape used on ductwork should fix most of that with minimal fuss.

That being said, if I could think of an alternative to can lights that also was as good at being directed mostly straight down, I'd plan on using that in this building addition. Sure you can install a fake ceiling, but it isn't the same. Actually florescent lights with LED replacement tubes might be an alternative, at least if you could find one that doesn't look horrible. The tubes tend to be glass which might make the led more diffuse, and if you covered it, more still.

Re:"hard use" and replacing CFGs

[Anonymous Coward]

"A typical thermometer has about half a gram of Mercury".

In which countries are thermometers with real mercury in them still sold to the public?

colour spectrum

[johnrpenner]

with incandescents — the ive found the colour spectrum left me with the 'blues' — it was only when halogens came on the scene, that i felt that we finally had a bulb that got us closer to a natural sunshine daylight full spectrum bulb. then came compact flourescents —those toxic (mercury) abonitations made poor lighting quality manditory. thank god LEDs came in just in time to forstall the takeover of the CFLs.

consumers should be given a choice — halogen bulbs still have the best colour spectrum imo.
why should we be banned from having good colour quality bulbs!? tax them, or whatever if the
reason is because of the energy efficiency — but it is not because the quality of the lighting is better.

Re:colour spectrum

[Hadlock]

LED and CFL lights come with their color temperature written on the box. If you want daylight get a 4500K bulb, if you want yellow get 3000K, if you want candle light get 2000K. If you can't find the color temp you want, buy them online. If you don't like blue, don't buy anything above 4000K on the box.

Re:colour spectrum

[iggymanz]

the problem is LED are made of a weird combo of two bulbs, look at the real spectrum of them, like a unicorn snail or something.....

bulbs based on hot things have nicer smoother spectrum

yes I have LED at home, but one halogen for occasional use at my computer workstation for documents is nicer

Re:colour spectrum

[Anonymous Coward]

It's far more complicated than looking at Kelvin rating. The color rendering index is equally important! But for me the biggest issue is dimming. Ignoring the issues with ELV PWM or limitations of MLV constant voltage or current reduction dimmers, color rendering during dimming is VASTLY different between incandescent/halogen and LED. The biggest difference is how the color temperature shifts. With incandescent and halogen to color shifts to a very pleasant warm glow, perfect for low lighting! LEDs color temperature tends to be fairly stable across the dimming range (*depending on quality of the LED and driver).

All the light in my house was recently replace with 100% LED ranging from LED strips in cornices, strip light above/below cabinet, track lights, sconces, chandelier, etc. While it's nice to have a ton of lighting with lower power draw and less heat generation, dimming a constant color temperature feels off. The ambience in the evenings is completely off.

Yes, there are some bulbs and strips which allow programmatic changes to the color though the quality and availability for my use case is still very lacking.

I suspect in 10 years or so LEDs will improve even further, but they currently do not match the ambience of incandescent and halogen when needed.

Re:colour spectrum

[drinkypoo]

the problem is LED are made of a weird combo of two bulbs, look at the real spectrum of them, like a unicorn snail or something.....

Most white LEDs are fluorescent lights, they're just not tubes. They are UV LEDs and the plastic lens is doped with phosphors which absorb the UV and then emit visible light. There are also RGB LEDs, but IME they are seldom used in any light which doesn't have a color-changing feature.

Re:colour spectrum

[iggymanz]

that style of LED has weird spectrum too (as do other old-school fluorescent type bulbs).

good enough for everyday use, but it's still not as nice on the eyes as hot metal.

Re:colour spectrum

[Anonymous Coward]

Most white LEDs are fluorescent lights, they're just not tubes.

Most are shitty white LEDs without any remote phosphors and look like crap.

They are UV LEDs and the plastic lens is doped with phosphors which absorb the UV and then emit visible light.

No they are not UV. Phosphors run at different frequencies than florescent bulbs.

Re:colour spectrum

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't like blue, don't buy anything above 4000K on the box.

It won't matter. The distribution of frequencies in the output spectrum are what matters. Lower temperature lights still give off a shitty blue fringe that makes things look gross and "dead".

I fucking hate LEDs because they look like shit. Not all LEDs. Some are good but you have to pay much $$$$ for them. Few are willing to do that so the end result is shitty lighting all around me.

The street lights ... the fucking LED street lights... I hate the most ... not only are they too high temperature for night time they don't have any goddamn diffusers.. it's all lowest bidder shit who cares about blinding suns everywhere you go or blue light hazard.

What really really irks me ... over the top irks me are LED Christmas lights. Totally ruined Christmas... The fuckers put the lowest quality white LEDs on strings and couple that with half wave rectifiers. Not only do they look SICK as in gross... they FLICKER TOO!!! G****AMN FLICKERING!!!!

The different colored leds look nice... why can't they do strings of them... instead of this white led shit? Everything to piss me off... the world fucking hates me... lowest bidder path of least resistance everything... nobody cares about anything else.

Re:colour spectrum

[Anonymous Coward]

For the record, they're blue LEDs, not UV. (And with current technology LED efficiency starts dropping fast when you push into UV wavelengths.) That's the reason "white" LED spectrums have an extra peak around 450 nm.
Also I believe "coated" is a more appropriate term than "doped" for the application of phosphors--doping being a semiconductor thing to me.

Re:colour spectrum

[Anonymous Coward]

If you want daylight, it's 6500K, not 4500K.

Re:colour spectrum

[encad]

the problem is LED are made of a weird combo of two bulbs, look at the real spectrum of them, like a unicorn snail or something.....

Most white LEDs are fluorescent lights, they're just not tubes. They are UV LEDs and the plastic lens is doped with phosphors which absorb the UV and then emit visible light. There are also RGB LEDs, but IME they are seldom used in any light which doesn't have a color-changing feature.

No, must are blue light LEDs, as they can be produced in big numbers (thanks Nakamoto) and are good enough for the job (coating them for the downshift in colours).
UVs are used for some appliances (e.g. shopping), but they are actually less efficient and more expensive.

Coating produces a wider spectrum, while the LEDs are monochromatic, so RGBs are not used for white light because they make even shittier light than cheap blue-light-converting ones.

Re:colour spectrum

[Anonymous Coward]

The color rendering of an LED or a fluorescent is crap compared to any incandescent bulb or sunlight. I have no particular dislike of LED's and the benefits of them is obvious. But there are plenty of people who need incandescent bulbs for what they do, and heavy handed behavior by legislative bodies (or plutocrats in this case) probably isn't going to help the environment all that much. Germany's energy policies have turned out to be a joke in terms of their impact on carbon consumption.

Re:colour spectrum

[Toad-san]

You may not want blue light.
https://www.allaboutvision.com...

Re:colour spectrum

[MtViewGuy]

Actually, LED light bulbs sold in the USA come in two main "color temperatures," 2700 K and 5000 K. 2700 K is very close to the color spectrum of incandescent bulbs, while 5000 K is close to that of fluorescent tubes. 2700 K is probably best-suited for general home use.

Re:colour spectrum

[Anonymous Coward]

"Color temperature" is appropriate for black body, wide & continuous spectrum emitters, such as incandescent lamps.

Freaky things like CFL and LEDs emit in a few narrow spectral peaks, so while those peaks may touch the spectral curve implied by the "color temperature", actual color rendering under their emissions can be totally different than an incandescent.

Not in the US though

[sirpwn4g3]

I've yet to see a CFL or LED bulb that lasts as long as incandescent bulbs in the US. I've used several brands and wattage's. What's most frustrating about the new LEDs is they're all advertised as '10 year bulbs' but have a 1 year warranty, then die in 9 months. The higher cost per bulb is simply not worth the savings in my electric bill, especially with constantly rising rates.

Re:Not in the US though

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't know what you're doing with your lights. We converted all our recessed ceiling lights throughout the house to LED four years ago, and I haven't had to replace a single bulb since. With the old halogen spots, I was up on a ladder at least once a month replacing one that had burned out.

Re:Not in the US though

[Anonymous Coward]

I've yet to see a CFL or LED bulb that lasts as long as incandescent bulbs in the US.

You must be holding it wrong. Even the dollar-store LED bulbs I buy last way longer than incandescents. CFLs are better, but even they don't measure up to the rated lifetime of LEDs.

Re:Not in the US though

[Rhipf]

I've yet to see a CFL or LED bulb that lasts as long as incandescent bulbs in the US. I've used several brands and wattage's. What's most frustrating about the new LEDs is they're all advertised as '10 year bulbs' but have a 1 year warranty, then die in 9 months.

The higher cost per bulb is simply not worth the savings in my electric bill, especially with constantly rising rates.

So if the bulb dies after 9 month get a replacement under warranty. Extending the warranty to 10 years wouldn't help your bulb that died after only 9 months.

Re:Not in the US though

[Anonymous Coward]

There's one of these people in every crowd, even my father who hoarded incandescent bulbs back in the day has totally switched over to LEDs now. Aside from a few that were of a crappy brand all of the CFLs and LEDs I installed when I moved into this house several years ago are still working and they get used for several hours every day.

Re:Not in the US though

[Anonymous Coward]

I've yet to see a CFL or LED bulb that lasts as long as incandescent bulbs in the US. I've used several brands and wattage's. What's most frustrating about the new LEDs is they're all advertised as '10 year bulbs' but have a 1 year warranty, then die in 9 months.

CFL's I have for outdoor lighting keep dieing they don't like the cold. I replace at least one per year and will keep replacing until I run out.

Lots of LEDs out there with crummy drivers. Lighting element will practically last forever ... lowest bidder electronics not so much.

Having said that I found some really nice high CRI LED tube replacements with remote phosphors that cost a fortune but so far work great.

The higher cost per bulb is simply not worth the savings in my electric bill, especially with constantly rising rates.

I have an energy prediction spreadsheet that is able to guess my power bill to within 30 constant watts after inputting HVAC runtime and night hours. It turns out lighting is just not a factor at all. I have incandescents in many areas still original bulbs from when the house was built like 15 years ago. Actual power on time is so small it's not even worth recording power usage for them. Replacing them would be environmentally irresponsible given energy cost of production.

At the end of the day what matters is not how much energy a piece of equipment draws it's how long it runs. Shitty power transforms sitting idle 24x7 can easily consume more constant watts than a Microwave once you convert usage to constant watts. Results once you actually take the time to do some math are somewhat counter intuitive.

Re:Not in the US though

[Anonymous Coward]

I have two lamps with LED that I leave burning 24/7. So far they've been on over 3 years. I promise you an incandescent would have burned out long before that.

Better late than never

[reboot246]

I live in "backwards" Alabama and I changed over to LED lights a while back. Even my flashlights are LEDs. Most of my friends and family have switched, too. The only incandescent bulbs in my house are in the oven and refrigerator (they'll probably outlast me). Welcome to the 21st Century, Europe!

Re:Better late than never

[spacec0w]

So as far as we know, at least 5-10 households in Alabama have voluntarily moved to LED lighting! In case you didn't really read the summary this is a policy that will eventually affect 400 million people living on an entire subcontinent.

This is total garbage

[SirAstral]

Not because incandescent bulbs are being phased out but because it does not solve any problems. Just like incandescent bulbs have always been manufactured to be intentionally limited so will LED lights. Waste will not be cut by any meaningful measurement. Sure power will be lower, but the mfg's never had to worry about that issue anyways.

I have had several LED lights fail within just a fraction of their lifespans, and by different MFG's as well. What is even worse is that LED's are not the only things that can fail. The power supply components on these bulbs that get hot fail often as well, ensuring that the entire bulb is now worthless.

There is more than one way to sucker an ignorant group of politicians.

Re:This is total garbage

[skids]

I would advise buying your next LED bulbs on an online site that allows you to post reviews, then when they fail, going back to the product page and giving it a bad review. And try to remember to give a good review to whatever bulb has outlasted the others once a year.

Re:This is total garbage

[Anonymous Coward]

LEDs are terrible for lighting anything except gauges on a instrument panel. They are overbright and toward the blue spectrum, and make every thing feel sterile like warehouse/hospital fluorescents. Incandescent bulbs are the best, most natural, warm illumination you can buy. Like you said, the only reason they dont last is because the legacy of the Phoebus cartel and "conspired obscelesence" is still going strong.

There's a lightbulb at a California Fire Dept that has been burning continuously for like 100 years. Through earthquakes and everything else.

That incandescent bulb has lived longer than most people.

Re:This is total garbage

[Anonymous Coward]

LED lifetime stats are a massive fraud.

They state ridiculous numbers but omit the fact that that's only the LED itself in lab conditions. In real-world applications LEDs fail MUCH sooner. All these LED bulbs come with circuitry that lasts nowhere near the rated hours. They're also often designed badly, with insufficient heat sinks or overdriven, all of which reduces the lifetime dramatically.

Re:This is total garbage

[Jeremi]

Not because incandescent bulbs are being phased out but because it does not solve any problems. [...] Sure power will be lower

So, which is it? Or does reducing power usage not count as solving a problem?

Just like incandescent bulbs have always been manufactured to be intentionally limited so will LED lights. Waste will not be cut by any meaningful measurement.

That's exactly what I said when they started selling automobiles -- the change would never help with the nation's horseshit-in-the-streets problem, because auto manufacturers would deliberately add horseshit to their cars so that they could sell more of them. Perfectly logical, no?

Come to think of it, I think I know where all the horseshit has actually gone to -- it's now being used to power incoherent Slashdot posts.

Re:This is total garbage

[avandesande]

I've been using cheepo lowes led bulbs for years and have only had one fail. My first one about 8 years old is still in use on my bed stand.

Re:This is total garbage

[iggymanz]

Bad grounding will kill an LED bulb. Check out your home's earth ground.

LED of many brands have worked well for me BUT I know with two relatives they were toasting early and often because of bad ground (which caused other problems too)

Re:This is total garbage

[SirAstral]

"So, which is it? Or does reducing power usage not count as solving a problem?"

Your thinking is too narrow. Just like how everyone found out that the total energy needed to produce ethanol as a fuel was not really saving any effort, if LED light manufacturing is allowed to do the same we are not "technically saving energy". We are just playing a card trick by moving the cost of energy outside of your home and towards the constant manufacturing of cheap and poor quality LEDs that do not last. But it appears that this little bait and switch is lost on you which is they reason I said what I said.

"That's exactly what I said when they started selling automobiles -- the change would never help with the nation's horseshit-in-the-streets problem, because auto manufacturers would deliberately add horseshit to their cars so that they could sell more of them. Perfectly logical, no?"

Speaking of "horseshit". The mfg industries have a well documented history of "planned obsolescence" and your mockery only shows how ignorant you are of it all. It is far too easy to trick people like you because all that is needed is to put on a little "theater" to get you to believe anything.

Re:This is total garbage

[SirAstral]

I agree with your idea, the point I was trying to get at is that once again the politicians wasted a bunch of effort putting in "feel good" laws that are more waste of time than a value add to the problem at hand.

These kinds of laws are nothing more than feel good legislation to get ignorant voters off their backs or an end run parlay by mfgs to gain a market advantage through regulation.

If they want to make sensible regulation by enforcing a minimal manufacturing quality like forcing LEDs to carry a minimum 20 year warranty where mfgs are also legally required to stage recycling centers at hardware suppliers and "free shipping" then they would be getting somewhere. Until then, it is my opinion they just tricked a whole bunch of voters into thinking the did something good without really doing anything meaningful at all... other than to get rid of halogen bulbs.

The same amount of energy and waste will likely be had with LED production because it is just too easy to game the system.

Re:This is total garbage

[Rhipf]

Incandescent bulbs are the least "natural" light. This is assuming by natural you mean sunlight. If by natural you mean "what I am used to" then I guess I will buy that. The light of incandescent bulbs is on the yellow end of the spectrum (yes I know you can get daylight incandescent bulb talking in generality here). The "sterile like warehouse/hospital fluorescents" lights are toward the blue end of the spectrum. Sunlight tends to be closer to the "sterile like warehouse/hospital fluorescents" color temperature than the light of incandescent bulbs.

As to your anecdote on the firehouse incandescent bulb, let's just wait a hundred years to see if there are any LEDs that are still running before we praise one over the other.

incandescent light - 2700K-3000K (you can get cool white and bright white in the 4000K-6000K as well)
led light - 4100K (you can find LEDs in all ranges 2700K-6500K)
sunlight - 5000K-5500K (at midday)

Re:This is total garbage

[drinkypoo]

Just like incandescent bulbs have always been manufactured to be intentionally limited so will LED lights.

You can make a light bulb that lasts longer, but it will also use more power for a given amount of light. It would cost you more to pay for the additional power consumption than it does to replace the light bulbs. LED lights, on the other hand, actually will be designed to sell to a price point that has nothing to do with lifespan. That's why the glass globes fell off my otherwise perfectly-working Cree lights.

Re:This is total garbage

[SirAstral]

The inspector for my home says it passed for grounding. I have also verified this visually myself and with a wiring tester. So far the test is okay unless I have a fault somewhere that showed good while I tested it but gets faulty if something shifts, which is possible.

However, I am not aware of bad grounding being a culprit for LED failures. Grounding is not something that really has play in electrical applications in this way. Electrical grounding is a safety mechanism and if grounding is being engaged in a way that it is part of my LED failures, then I likely have a bigger problem than proper grounding going on and need to find out the source of whatever is causing electrical problems that are leading to early LED failure.

Re:This is total garbage

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, is that what you said? when they started selling automobiles huh? like a hundred plus years ago?

Why dont you just relax & enjoy your cheap Chinese LEDs behind the comfy haze of your cataracts, while you still can, you old bast
 

Re:This is total garbage

[Jeremi]

You mistake cynicism for wisdom.

Yes, companies have at times engaged in "planned obsolescence". In a monopoly scenario (or an oligopoly where all manufacturers are colluding with each other), that can be a nefarious way to increase profits at the expense of consumers and the environment, because in those scenarios consumers have little choice but to buy a bad product more often.

The problem with your analysis is, the LED industry is nothing like a monopoly or a colluding oligopoly. There are hundreds of LED manufacturers competing for the consumer's dollar, and plenty of information online for consumers to read up on regarding which LED manufacturers put out a quality, long-lasting product and which ones do not.

In this scenario, manufacturers that intentionally sabotage their own product will not be able to compete against manufacturers who do not sabotage their own product, and will either go out of business or will be relegated to the very low-end, extremely-price-conscious, lowest-margin parts of the market.

If your ideas about how the manufacturing works were true, consumers would not have access to any high-quality products, since there would never be any economic incentive for any manufacturer to increase product quality -- and yet a quick look around you will demonstrate this is not the case. Compare the quality of automobiles today, versus automobiles in the 1970's. Or computers today versus computers in the 1990's. Or Internet service today versus 10 years ago. It all continually gets better and/or cheaper as technology permits, to the extent that free competition exists between manufacturers that forces them to maximize their quality/cost ratio if they want consumers to buy their own product rather than a competitor's product.

Re:This is total garbage

[Anonymous Coward]

Incandescent lights are not buying phased out, they are now illegal to make, sell or use. For a while we have been permitted to use expensive, short-lasting halogen bulbs instead.

Luckily, our country has been a staunch NATO member from the start and it has always supported America's wars, just like America helped win our World wares (and the war in former Yugo-Slavia), so no we implore President Trump to honour our special relationship and open his nuclear arsenals to regain the liberty of his allies under attack from Communautarism and make Europe safe for Economy.

Light Bulb Cartels Incoming

[fuzzywhiterabbit]

I can't wait for the light bulb black market to come around. Mostly because I want there to be funny mob stories based around getting those sweet, sweet halogens.

bureaucratic health

[js290]

What are the long term health effects of LED light exposure? Why are bureaucrats dictating what light bulbs can be used?

Re:bureaucratic health

[Anonymous Coward]

To answer your questions, a well-known long term health effect of LED light exposure is to turn strong, hard working men into gay frogs. The bureaucrats are dictating what light bulbs can be used because they want to destroy mankind and replace us by lizard people.

How Will I Fry Bugs?

[Somebody Is Using My]

I have a free-standing halogen lamp. It's wonderfully bright but I rarely use it because it gives off a tremendous amount of heat and I do worry about its excessive power usage. But let me tell you, if ever there's a fly buzzing about the room that I can't catch or otherwise shoo out of the house, I turn on the light and let the little f#@&*r fry. The smell of roasting bug that inevitably wafts through the room ten minutes after I turn the lamp on after being annoyed for an hour by the victim's buzzing is extremely satisfying.

It's the only reason I keep the damn lamp, quite honestly.

Re:How Will I Fry Bugs?

[Anonymous Coward]

Buy of of these
https://www.amazon.com/ZappLight-BulbHead-Mosquito-Standard-Fixture/dp/B01DUXOON2/

Re:How Will I Fry Bugs?

[Anonymous Coward]

Your house smells like roasted bugs, that's fucking great work. You should work for Trump.

Re:How Will I Fry Bugs?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't you have a bright light to fly towards yourself?

Longer life?

[Anonymous Coward]

Last year, I boughtf four LED bulbs at Home Depot. Not naming names, but the LED light company was one of the first developers of white LEDs in the US. All failed within six months. Sure, they sent replacements when I sent the failed ones back; but, that's not how things should be. The LEDs last many years, but the cheap electronics used to drive them is the problem.

Re:Longer life?

[sabbede]

I replaced almost every bulb in my house a couple of years ago and haven't had a single one go out since. Of course, now that I've said this, I'll probably get home to find all but one have exploded.

But in America...

[Anonymous Coward]

... we can count on our stupid Republican congress to vote against any such ban because FREEEEDOOOOOM!!!

Stocking up

[Anonymous Coward]

I have tried the LED substitutes for halogens, I forget the package, it's small, and they don't work well, and they cost a lot more.

But they are cheap, and easy to stockpile. I have a few cases of Edison bulbs too. I use LEDs when they work well but the tech isn't all there yet.

I quite like my halogen bulbs.

[Anonymous Coward]

I quite like my halogen bulbs. Thanks for the warning so I can get a few crates. Flickering LEDs and horrible white CFLs that take an age to light just don't cut it..

putins-poodle-newspapers-declare-trump-a-traitor-

[Anonymous Coward]

Nuland said "Fuck the EU" - in secret - That's worse than Trump fellating Putin on Television in Helsinki? https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jul/17/putins-poodle-newspapers-declare-trump-a-traitor-after-helsinki-summit

You really think so, treasonous faggot apologist? BTW I never voted for ANY Clinton, so there's that. I wrote in Bernie - the sole NON TRAITOR on the ticket for sure. You can run along and blow Putin now bitch. Your boss is calling

Want to play more guardian quoting we can, bitch, but you lost this round whether your punk traitor ass can admit it or not.

Go to Pirate Bay ...

[CaptainDork]

... to get the 3D CAD files and make your own bulbs!

Re:Go to Pirate Bay ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy shit you're funny, Chris!

What a shame

[albeit unknown]

I wonder what the net energy savings actually is, since people simply now leave the lights on all the time.

I stocked up on hundreds of incandescent bulbs in the US before the ban went into effect. The black-body light is superior, full stop. No peaky semiconductor emission frequencies shining through the phosphor, leaving some colors dim. They also make my my eyes hurt if I happen to look at them directly.

I do mix incandescent with fluorescent at my workbench, for things like reading resistor color codes.

My efficiency plan is to turn them off when not in use.

Re:What a shame

[admin7087]

Why did you stock them in the US when the ban is only planned for the EU? Are you planning to travel from Europe to the US every time you need to replace a light bulb?

So you don't need a lwa

[Anonymous Coward]

Like in the USA, where they "banned" incandescent bulbs, but then stripped out money for enforcement of the ban.

If LEDs are so wonderful, why not let the people decide what bulbs to buy?

If people want efficiency, long life, power savings, they will buy them of their own free will.

Why mandate and force people to buy certain products.

Let people decide what is best for themselves.

Typical nanny state control freaks !

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[Anonymous Coward]

If LEDs are so wonderful, why not let the people decide what bulbs to buy?

It was the only way to convince the electronics companies to invest in factories to produce the bulbs so that we had the option.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[Mass Overkiller]

They had LED bulbs before any incandescent bulb ban was in place.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[hawguy]

They had LED bulbs before any incandescent bulb ban was in place.

And they were much more expensive than they are today. My local big-box store sells house brand LED"s for around $1/each

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[mrclevesque]

Right.

He should have said "invest in **more** factories".

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[Anonymous Coward]

You can buy the incandescent bulbs at any home supply store in the Chicago area.

Re:So you don't need a lwa

[Ol Olsoc]

If LEDs are so wonderful, why not let the people decide what bulbs to buy?

If you aren't being a Poe, the biggest reason that CFL's and then LEDs have been brough into being is that they use less electricity, so you don't have to build that nice new nuc plant in your backyard.

Re:So you don't need a lwa

[jythie]

Why let the people decide? Because they never had any choice. Companies and marketing departments decide what you buy, not you, and not your neighbors.. and what your neighbors buy determines what price you pay and what choices you have on the shelves. Consumers do not decide squat.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[roc97007]

They had LED bulbs before any incandescent bulb ban was in place.

No, previous anonymous coward has a point. They existed, true, but they wouldn't be affordable until they were popular, which creates a chicken-and-egg issue.

For LEDs, this appears to have been a beneficial move. But the US tried to ban incandescents when the only affordable alternative was CFLs, which was a crappy technology. If the government is going to interfere with our lives, the least they could do is pick a decent product.

Re:So you don't need a lwa

[Darinbob]

The incandescent lightbulbs aren't banned for use. They just can't make more of them. A lot of stores still have them in stock. But they're less reliable than LEDs, take more power, don't last as long on average, and over time will cost more money.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[tsqr]

Great. Now look up the prices of 3-way LED bulbs.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[hawguy]

Great. Now look up the prices of 3-way LED bulbs.

I'm not my grandmother, I don't own any 3 way lamps - which is probably why the 3-way LED's cost so much, not much demand. Though the 3 way LED's seem to cost between $8 - $20. So maybe it'll take 2 years to recoup your costs instead of 2 months.

Re:So you don't need a lwa

[Crashmarik]

Why let the people decide? Because they never had any choice. Companies and marketing departments decide what you buy, not you, and not your neighbors.. and what your neighbors buy determines what price you pay and what choices you have on the shelves.

Consumers do not decide squat.

Yeah no one is ever responsible for their actions.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[tsqr]

Congratulations on not being your grandmother; I'm not your grandmother either.

I'm guessing you actually own a few 3-way lamps and just don't know it -- the majority of table and floor lamps available for purchase have 3-way fixtures, but you can put a single-wattage bulb in them and won't notice anything out of the ordinary. At any rate, your use case isn't everyone's use case, and those whose use cases are different from yours probably aren't your grandmother.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[Anonymous Coward]

Try checking the Power Factor of your $1 LED bulbs compared to dimmable LED's.

Unfortunately, the desire for cheapness (to help sell to cost-conscious consumers) means that the regulators used are as inexpensive as possible. This leads to very bad switching noise, which causes harmonic distortion on your AC line, which effectively lowers your power factor. I've seen power factors as low as 0.55, which means that your 10W LED now draws 18.2 VA

If you happen to have a utility that uses smart/digital electrical meters, your utility can see this, and will bill you accordingly. Theoretically, if your whole house is cheap LED, and only the lights are running, your house power factor could be low enough to cause your utility to charge you extra.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[Teun]

You are old fashioned.
For a very small price you can get LED bulbs that can be toggled to dim at 100%, 75%, 50% and 25% of output by just switching them off and on. Works perfectly.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[Anonymous Coward]

Gramps, time to stop typing, its time for your meds.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[Anonymous Coward]

Were you born an ignorant asshole or did you have to work at it?

Re:So you don't need a lwa

[jythie]

Yeah, somehow the people with the most power never seem to be responsible.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[Anonymous Coward]

WTF is a 3-way lamp/fixture?

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[RockDoctor]

Well, you do learn something some days. I'd never heard of a 3-way bulb until today. Must be an American thing, like lightbulbs with a screw fitting instead of a bayonet fitting - which I'd never seen before my mid-20s.

What is wrong with using two bulbs and two switches, and not having to carry an inventory of spares for these peculiarities?

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[tsqr]

Must be an American thing, like lightbulbs with a screw fitting instead of a bayonet fitting - which I'd never seen before my mid-20s.

Odd; the European E14 base sure looks like it has a screw fitting.

Re: So you don't need a lwa

[RockDoctor]

It (the E14) is. It's also something I never saw before my mid-30s. (I worked for a US-based company in my mid-20s, which is why we had to use spare parts - eg light bulbs - which we imported from Head Office in Texas at $25 each instead of getting a lightbulb and mount from the local hardware shop for about $6 (equivalent). The name of the game - painted onto the cover of every copy of the catalogue of part numbers, order codes and item prices - was "Repatriation of Profit". The catalogues also had "Confidential - US tax payer eyes only!" printed onto the front - but since we didn't have any US tax payers working in the company, we just ignored that.

I'm not sure when using and selling E14 and E28 lamps became more common. There was a major change of the electrical wiring codes in the different countries of the country between about 1995 and 2000 which caused no end of uncertainty for me as I was trying to figure out if I had to hire an electrician to install a shower, or if I could (legally) do the job myself. (I finally figured out that if I'd been in England, no, I had to get a sparky to do it; but in Scotland I could do it but had to use heavier cables than in England, for the same power of shower. So I did it.). At the same time I was trying to inventory-down all the various light fittings in the house so I only needed to keep two types of lamp for spare - 1m tube fluorescents, or B28 (bayonet) 150W equivalent CFLs for other rooms than the kitchen. But very annoyingly the desk anglepoise lamp which I really liked had an E28 (screw, otherwise "Large Edison Screw", LES) fitting and try as I might, I couldn't find a fitting to convert that to B28. Real annoyance. Then I got married, and within a year I had about a dozen different sizes of lamp in my "light bulb" box.

Coated Halogen

[Anonymous Coward]

Coated halogen bulbs have a bell curve that matches sunlight almost perfectly, and gets rid of the far ultraviolet. For some things, these coated halogens are indespensible. For instance, I bet that in the Louv're in Paris there are many coated halogens that are used to display paintings. Color is killed by LED light, which as you said is mostly blue. The LEDs and CFLs that claim to be "warm" have only a narrlow spike in the red regtion, and do not represent a contiguous bell curve like real sunlight. For color and photography work, and for museums, this is a bad thing to outlaw halogen

Re:Coated Halogen

[Howitzer86]

This is called the Color Rendering Index. Old street lamps have a low index, which is why everything beneath it shines a monochromatic orange.

Bulb life vs. efficiency

[Alwin Henseler]

Most incandescent bulbs are not rated anywhere near that long (most of the commercial ones were something like 1000 hours when I was still buying them) and the ones that could last that long are vastly different in design than the cheap commercial bulbs that were being sold.

Not "vastly different", just a thicker (=stronger) filament wire, and -possibly- tweaks to wire supports, gas mixture or whatever.

It's easy to make a long lasting incandescent. But it would also be very inefficient - worse than they already are. Therefore an 'optimum' is picked where bulbs don't need replacing too often, but still have acceptable efficiency. That optimum is picked around 1000 hours for regular incandescents (longer for halogen lamps due to their halogen cycle). Make 'em longer lasting, and you pay more for electricity. Make 'em more efficient, and you replace bulbs more often. So contrary to what some people think, that is not some industry conspiracy! Of course within that efficiency <-> longevity spectrum (no pun intended ;-) there can still be quality differences between bulbs.

Longer lasting incandescents do exist. Mostly meant for industrial uses where bulb replacement may be more costly than pulling some extra Watts. But such bulbs don't get around the problem described above. Likewise you can run incandescents on a lower voltage to increase their lifespan (in the case of halogens, only within limits). See "lamp rerating". But effectively that just takes the remaining few % of efficiency, and adds it to the waste heat you already had.

Make sure the LEDs are dark sky friendly

[Ranger]

Although LEDs reduce carbon dioxide emissions, if you don't use the right ones, they could make dark skies worse. Blue light is very disruptive to humans and animals. The International Dark Sky Association has the details on how to use dimmer lights and LEDs and nothing above 3000K. Also, don't illuminate where you don't need to: http://darksky.org/lighting/lighting-basics/.

Re:Make sure the LEDs are dark sky friendly

[Anonymous Coward]

I note that they recommend 3000K max for outdoors street lights, and thinking of recommending 2700K instead.

Perhaps efficiency increases allow to filter more of the bad light and still be efficient.
Thanks a ton for the link to this site!
I live in a somewhat big town and don't know how to fight the lights back but I shall find some interested parties who will know how to bring the issue up.
I don't know how to measure temperature. Feels like 4000K to 5000K to me. Disaster.
And yes, bright lights light up crime victims.

Re:Make sure the LEDs are dark sky friendly

[Ranger]

You are welcome. If I recall correctly I read that the city of Tucson recently switched to LED street lighting and not only did they use the correct type the reduced their output around 10%. Tucson has some nearby observatories so they try to keep their skies darker than comparable cities its size. I remember visiting Flagstaff a few years ago and they touted themselves as a Dark Skies approved town, so they are really dark at night. Anyway, the IDA is all about smart lighting.

Re:Make sure the LEDs are dark sky friendly

[encad]

Dimming or switching the light completely off is a lot more useful.

Philips made a large studys with a lot of different light sources and all had an impact.
@Ranger, 3000K and LED does not help, they still have peak emissions at around 420 - 450 nm, with the exception of some high-end products.
Using Green or Amber coloured LEDs might help, but as seen above, some species also react to this kind of lightings, so only using light where it is absolutely needed would do more for the enviroment.

Re:Make sure the LEDs are dark sky friendly

[Ranger]

@Ranger, 3000K and LED does not help,

@encad should let the IDA know. It was their recommendation not mine.

Just replaced LED's with Halogen

[Anonymous Coward]

In my bathroom I just replaced 3 brand new LED lights with halogen. The LED lights blinked on and off in synchronization at a rate I could see. It's really disconcerting showering when the room lights keep going on and off.

Aliexpress, here we come

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously... I'm not going to switch lights just because bureaucrats paid by Philips/Osram decided that those 3% of electricity that we spend on incandescent lights are too much.

Nothing beats the quality of light spectrum of incandescent lights - not LEDs, and certainly not CFLs. I'm staying with halogen.

Cheap Light Bulbs, or Saving Electricity?

[kenwd0elq]

I was an early adopter of the little pigtail compact fluorescent bulbs. THey were supposed to last way longer while saving electricity, and so were WORTH the higher cost per bulb. Except that they did NOT last longer. And if they saved pennies for electricity, they cost many dollars for expensive bulbs. Now we're dealing with the same issue with LEDs; LED bulbs cost $5 each (AFTER the considerable decrease in the last year) and still save a few pennies on the power bill.

I'm not sure that we're ahead in the long run. 75 watt incandescent bulbs used to be a buck or so for a 4-pack. Now I can get 10 LED bulbs for ONLY $50! And both LED and CFL bulbs were extraordinarily sensitive to heat buildup in enclosed fixtures. An incandescent bulb in the hallway lasts for a year and provides a lot of light. An LED bulb was a lot dimmer ( 6 watts, with an "effective illumination" of 60 watts) and lasted only a few weeks. Heat buildup, you see.

Re:Cheap Light Bulbs, or Saving Electricity?

[WindBourne]

Actually, the ORIGINAL CFLs really did last a long time. These were made in America and Europe. Then they went to china and corners were cut. Yeah, prices went down, but so did lifetime do to horrible quality on these bulbs. Same issue applies to LEDs. Heck, I had 1 LED bulb catch on fire. Not impressed.

Re: Cheap Light Bulbs, or Saving Electricity?

[Anonymous Coward]

Any evidence or just going with your gut?

Re:Cheap Light Bulbs, or Saving Electricity?

[sabbede]

Where are you shopping?

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Ph...

You Want More Brexit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because this is how you get more Brexit.

That yummy tetraethyllead... ummm...

[denzacar]

If people want efficiency, long life, power savings, they will buy them of their own free will.

Why mandate and force people to buy certain products.

Let people decide what is best for themselves.

Typical nanny state control freaks !

Funny...
We can actually tell your parents yelled out those same lines back when the phasing out of leaded gasoline was announced.

let's do the numbers for the US

[ooloorie]

Electricity is responsible for about 34% of US carbon emissions. Of those 34%, about 7% are residential and commercial lighting, with less than half of that being residential lighting. We're down to less than 1% of US carbon emissions due to residential lighting now. Halogen is less than 10% of that market, so we're down to less than 0.1% of US carbon emissions due to halogen bulbs. LEDs are a lot more efficient than those, saving you probably up to 75% of those carbon emissions, but the impact overall is negligible.

Furthermore, some of those savings may not be realized because in many situations, the lower heat output from LEDs needs to be made up for by more heating. It's also likely that the environmental impact of manufacturing LEDs is higher than for halogen bulbs. And although nominally LEDs last a long time, the electronics in them have significant failure rates in my experience.

Does that mean it's a bad thing to replace your halogen bulbs with LEDs? Not at all. I did that in my home years ago. But it won't "slash emissions and energy bills"; in fact, there are high up-front costs and the main effect of these laws is likely going to be to increase prices and compliance costs for new buildings a little.

Re:let's do the numbers for the US

[WindBourne]

Correct.
America does not have that many haologen. As such, we will not save that much. However, we really need to require high Lumen per watt bulbs when tenants or owners change. That way, if somebody has a particular situation that really does not do well with LEDs, they can switch to halogen, or regular bulbs, etc.

Where we really need to focus in America is our HVAC. HVAC accounts for about 1/3-1/2 of a resident/commercial usage. Unlike Europe, we do not really have all that great of climate, so, we need to insulate better and ideally use better HVAC method.
Again, California screwed up. Simply requiring loads of Solar on a home does not do any good. Instead, we should require that all new buildings below 6 stories to have enough ON-SITE UNSUBSIDIZED AE to equal or exceed the energy of total HVAC ( IOW, both heating and cooling). The only exception should be Alaska. With this, it will actually get builders to lower the energy that HVAC uses. They will add insulation, highly insulated windows, low-heat bulbs such as LEDs or any new tech, and likely geo-thermal HVAC, since all of this is much cheaper than unsubsidizied solar/hydro/wind/etc.
Basically, this will drive down the prive of all things connected with doing buildings correctly.

Re:let's do the numbers for the US

[ooloorie]

America does not have that many haologen.

Actually, the halogen percentage I quoted is worldwide; it's probably even less in the US.

However, we really need to require high Lumen per watt bulbs when tenants or owners change.

Yeah, let's put in more useless laws to save 0.01% in carbon emissions and increase new housing costs!

Again, California screwed up.

California requires R13-R15 for walls, Spain requires about R9. So, regulations are already substantially stricter in the US.

Where we really need to focus in America is our HVAC. HVAC accounts for about 1/3-1/2 of a resident/commercial usage. Unlike Europe...

Unlike Europe, Americans are wealthier and therefore are willing to pay more for comfortable temperatures inside their homes and offices. That's the difference right there. It's also why we drive more, own more cars, have bigger homes, and generally consume more energy. In fact, the US is pretty much on the regression line for per capita energy use vs per capita gdp, which is pretty good given the climate extremes in the US and our substantially bigger homes.

Re:let's do the numbers for the US

[Anonymous Coward]

You're forgetting Americans use 2-3 times as much electricity as Europeans. it's 1% of a much bigger number. it won't make as big of a difference obviouisly because Americans are much dirtier.

phase-out will prevent more than 15m tonnes of carbon emissions a year,

If America did the same, it would still prevent more than 15m tonnes of carbon emissions, just your totals from other things are much worse and hide the impact.

“A halogen bulb may be cheaper to buy in the first place but the electricity costs will be much more expensive, whereas an LED bulb will pay for itself within a year.”

It's hardly a high upfront cost if it pays for itself in about a year. A little longer for America because your electricity is cheaper.

Re: let's do the numbers for the US

[Anonymous Coward]

This person gets it. Rich people pollute more because they are rich. High consumption countries pollute more because they consume more.

Who is the richest and highest consuming country, America.

Re:let's do the numbers for the US

[Anonymous Coward]

https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs...

The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates that in 2017, the U.S. residential sector and the commercial sector used about 273 billion kilowatthours (kWh) of electricity for lighting. This was about 10% of the total electricity consumed by both of these sectors and about 7% of total U.S. electricity consumption. Residential lighting consumption was about 129 billion kWh or about 9% of total residential sector electricity consumption in 2017. The commercial sector, which includes commercial and institutional buildings, and public street and highway lighting, consumed about 143 billion kWh for lighting, equal to about 11% of total commercial sector electricity consumption in 2017. EIA does not have an estimate specifically for public street and highway lighting.

https://www.eia.gov/kids/energ...

38% of electricity is residential and commercial.

38% of total energy, 74% residential and commercial, with 10% of that for lighting.
equals 2.8% of total energy is for lighting (thats not even counting industrial lighting).
If all incandescent bulbs were replaced with LED (it wouldn't cost anything after a year or so due to electricity savings) you could save about 60% of that say about 1.7% of total US energy emissions (for free).
That may not sound like much,
https://rhg.com/research/final...

EIA released their final estimates this week which align with our preliminary numbers. Energy-related CO2 emissions fell by 0.66% last year

But it's 2 and a half years at the current US rate of decline. So quite meaningful (if you are pretending US is meaningfully cutting emissions, an argument for another day perhaps)

Re:let's do the numbers for the US

[Anonymous Coward]

The person below you gets it.
Rich people pollute more because they are rich. High consumption countries pollute more because they consume more.

Who is the richest and highest consuming country, America.
How is it that you still don't understand?
Are you paid not to?

Re:let's do the numbers for the US

[WindBourne]

So many things right and wrong here.
First off, Most European nations are quite rich. Look, there are 2 ways of looking at this. The first is the AVERAGE/mean, which really does not tell you much about the population. It is the median that tells you everything. America is #5 with mean,but we are #24 using Median. Nations like Germany and Sweden are just below America,while most of Europe is ABOVE America. For example, France, UK, Spain, all of the netherlands, etc are all wealthier than America. So, that argument goes out the door.
Likewise, Canada and Australia both use more Energy per capitia than does America.

Do you realize the difference between R13 and R9? Back in the 70s, my family built a 7500' home. We have R20 in the walls and R30 in the Roof. Why? Because my dad said that energy was going to go up in costs and made it so that a simple oak log would heat our home when it was -40 or a small AC could cool us when it was 105F. And that was the case.
In my own home, I have R20 in the walls/ceiling and took it to R-30 in the ceiling. Now, with solar panels on the roof, our AC bill is next to nothing (relatively little heating in the attic).

Now, as to paying for our HVAC, America has wider temperature extremes. Very few places in Europe go from -30F to 105F (or -35C to 41C). And that is just our midwest. Go to the southwest, and you run from 25F to 115F (-5C to 47C).
In addition, we actually pay LESS than most of Europe. Europe likes to compare electricity to us, but Europe is far to the north and they use mostly Nat Gas for heating. Spain and soon France, are going to be installing lots of AC, due to their temps starting to be more like ours.
Then you have the issue with traveling more. Europeans really do not travel. They go to nations next door, but few of them have actually left Europe. And Europe is smaller than our eastern seaboard. As such, traveling in America takes energy due to how far we have to go. For example, few Europeans will travel 60-200 miles to go to their job. Heck, America has more km of railroad tracks than European Union does. And yet, we need it due to our massive size compared to Europe.

No, we DO consume more energy than many other nations, but Europe is actually a lot closer than most ppl realize. The fact is, that Europe HAD one of the best living conditions. Now, with AGW, they will have to deal with temp extremes similar to ours. That will mean that they will be installing lots more AC, which is already the case. North America is relatively flat, while Europe has started to increase for the last couple of years, and for decades, China and south east Asia has WAY outsold America for ACs. In fact, looking at it, Europes residential demand for AC is bigger than North Americas (not surprising). It is in the commercial that it is not the case.

Re:let's do the numbers for the US

[CaffeinatedBacon]

So many things right and wrong here. No, we DO consume more energy than many other nations, but Europe is actually a lot closer than most ppl realize.

No it isn't.

The fact is, that Europe HAD one of the best living conditions. Now, with AGW, they will have to deal with temp extremes similar to ours. That will mean that they will be installing lots more AC, which is already the case. North America is relatively flat, while Europe has started to increase for the last couple of years, and for decades, China and south east Asia has WAY outsold America for ACs. In fact, looking at it, Europes residential demand for AC is bigger than North Americas (not surprising). It is in the commercial that it is not the case.

Are you really surprised Asia, with multiple times as many people as America. Who had hundreds of millions of poor people unable to afford AC, are now starting to buy more AC as they become rich enough to do so? That should be obvious to anyone. What you probably don't realize is that most of those units will be more efficient than the old American ones. (Europe also has some relatively poorer places, it's not all climate causing the demand).

Re:let's do the numbers for the US

[Anonymous Coward]

Credit Suisse S.A. publishes each year in Autumn the Global Wealth Report Databook. It reports all figures referred to the net wealth. These figures are influenced by real estate prices, equity market prices, exchange rates, liabilities, incidence in a country of the adult population, human resources, natural resources and capital and technological advancements ,which may create new assets or render others worthless in the future. During periods when equity markets experienced strong growth, the relative national and per capita wealth of the countries where people are more exposed on those markets, such as the United States and United Kingdom, tend to rise. On the other hand, when equity markets are depressed, the relative wealth of the countries where people invest more in real estate or bonds, such as France and Italy, tend to rise instead. Countries with more aged population like Germany and Italy would have higher relative wealth, if calculated per capita and not per adult

It's not as simple as you claim.

EU has basically the same amount of rail, it's a rounding error. You have a massive size and barely any extra rail? That's meant to be a good thing is it?

Lower Electricity Bills

[Anonymous Coward]

If you think for one second any drop in usage won't immediately cause a corresponding rate hike, I got a fucking bridge to sell you (it's E-bridge, made of bitcoin$).

Surprised CA is not doing this right

[WindBourne]

Seriously, the right way is not to ban bulbs, just simply require bulbs with a certain level of lumens / watts. In particular, whenever a new tenant or new owner is moving in, then all bulbs should have at least 70 lumens / watts and no hazmat materials. THis way, new homes, along with landlords, will all have to have put in high LPW and safe bulbs. After that, if somebody wants to swap around a bulb, then it is their choice.

This approach is probably better than simply banning bulbs.

Re:Surprised CA is not doing this right

[hankwang]

"the right way is not to ban bulbs, just simply require bulbs with a certain level of lumens / watts."

Which is exactly what the EU regulations do. It's just that the thresholds in lm/W are picked exactly to cover standard and now incandescents, but a LED supplier that somehow manages to get incandescent-like efficiencies would also be affected.

I think there was another tier of lm/W for an experimental incandescent technology that has not (yet) been proven viable: incandescent bulbs with an IR-reflective coating that reflects some of the infrared back onto the filament. (I didn't look into the details, but I think for that to work, you'd need to pose unrealistic requirements on the shape of the filament and shape tolerance of the bulb.)

Re:Surprised CA is not doing this right

[Anonymous Coward]

The emissions cost is staggering. Buildings account for about 40% of our energy consumption – and lighting currently accounts for around 15% of that. That gives it a carbon footprint higher than aviation and shipping combined.

That's in low emitting EU, hate to think how bad it is in America.
Still going to blame business and governments and not people? Still think more people wont make more pollution?

Re:Surprised CA is not doing this right

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, the right way is not to ban bulbs, just simply require bulbs with a certain level of lumens / watts.

Which is exactly what the EU regulations do.

LOL the right way to do it is the way they are doing it already.

This approach is probably better than simply banning bulbs.

What approach Windy? The one they are already doing?
Why constantly add your 2c when you have no idea what you're talking about?

Re:Surprised CA is not doing this right

[WindBourne]

If Europe is based on Lumens/watts, than why ban halogen?

Re:Surprised CA is not doing this right

[vandamme]

Because they are way too inefficient to meet the standard.

Re:Surprised CA is not doing this right

[CaffeinatedBacon]

Stop reading the headlines and thinking you know what you are talking about Windy. You keep tripping over your own feet.

CRI

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with most LEDs is a combination of lower output power, flicker (missing capacitors in the rectifier circuit), bad colour temperature, and, critically, poor CRI (colour rendering index). A CRI of 95% (and colour temp of 2700k) is fairly decent; most LEDs have 80 or less, and 400K+. Decent LEDs do exist, but typically at 5x the price - and are not easy to find.

Re:CRI

[Anonymous Coward]

This.
My eyes are very sensitive to any flickering and I haven't found not one LED incandescent/halogen bulb replacement, where I live, that doesn't flicker to some visible degree. I've had some luck with adding capacitors to LED panels. But still there's that poor CRI, sharp light and color temperature with some nonsense value.

Also many of them are inefficient and with short lifetimes, despite of the leds. Partly because of bad power supply circuits and partly because the LEDs are overdriven to get more light.

I know the technology is there. I could build a good LED panel myself if I could be bothered to invest this kind of time.
There should be decent LED "lightbulbs" and fixtures available locally before banning halogen lightbulbs.

Tax, don't ban

[Anonymous Coward]

They keep making the same mistake. People don't like stuff being taken away. Don't ban stuff, make it expensive. Put a steep tax on inefficient light bulbs. Use the tax revenue to buy efficient lights and hand those out as samples.

Europe's also not fighting 8 wars

[rsilvergun]

to secure cheap energy like the US is. Your bill isn't going down but your dependency is.

One upping the French

[theendlessnow]

Britain has promised to discontinue use of the Sun by 2025.

No thanks, I don't want to sit in the dark

[johannesg]

I use a single halogen lamp to light my living room. I tried replacing it by an LED lamp with a stated lumen rating that was the same as the halogen, but found my room darkened to the point where I found it hard to even read a book. In my estimation the LED only gave off around a quarter of the light of the halogen.

I'm all in favor of saving energy. Having said that, I'm not going to spend the rest of my life like a f*cking medieval peasant, sitting in the dark.

This is bad news for lava lamps

[Anonymous Coward]

Lava lamps need the heat output from a filament lamp. We recently had to purchase a new bulb for ours. The only one that would work was a mini halogen spot.
So this could be bad. I'm posting this anonymously because I'm unable to login to /. due to my password being wrong. I'm unable to rest my password because the site requires you to input your old password Doh!!!!

Some insights on lighting

[encad]

Ok, I worked some time in my past with lighting professionally, mainly in Measurement of General Lighting Appliances.

So what is actually banned now: two additional types of high voltage halogen reflector Lamps. Does this mean you get now halogen lighting anymore?
No, you still get low voltage (12 V usually) lamps with and without integrated reflector. These might be subject of another ban in the future, but chances are that they will stay with us in the future.

First of, if anyone has additional questions, feel free to get in touch, I will try to answer to the best of my knowledge.

I'll try to give some insight to the random topics I saw here.

Why banning this lamps?
You can read the exact parts here https://ec.europa.eu/energy/si...
The EU started off with banning most of the Halogen Incandescent used with mains voltage (eg. 230 V or 110 V). The Low Voltage Variants are not banned by this. The mains voltage lamps are practical but shit. The tungsten filament is thinner and longer compared to the low voltage variants and not as sturdy, which means that they have a lower colour temperature, worse optical characteristics, shortend lifetime and even worse efficacy.

Some basics on lighting:
What we perceive as light is electromagnetic radiation with a general wavelength range of 380 nm (blue) to 780 nm (red). We do not have a uniform distribution of the sensitivity. In measurement a fixed distribution is used to describe this sensitivity (v(lamda)), with Peak sensitivity at 555 nm (green).
Mixing light of several different bandwidths then gives the Impression of Colour, there are several systems for describing colours, in lighting the most common used is the CIE "triangle"/"horseshoe".

In general Lighting CCT (Correlated color temperature) is used to describe shades of white. When using Incandescent Lamps this is the actual temperature of the filament, with tungsten being one of the metals that can withstand 3000 K for a prolonged period. As Fluorescent Lamps / LED / HID Lamps use other methods for light generation a Correlated Colour Temperature is used. This takes the emitted spectrum of a lightsource and converts it into a value that has some resemblance of a Colour Temperature, it is still not the actual Colour Temperature.
Commonly this is coupled with a value called CRI (Colour Rendering Index) which compared the given spectrum to either an synthetic incandescent or daylight spectrum. So by default Incandescent lamps should have a CRI of 100.

White LEDs:
There are no white LEDs. The most common construction today is a blue LED coated with phosphors which convert the blue light to longer wavelengths, similar to a fluorescent lamp. Close to all "white" LED Lamps has a blue peak at about 450 nm, their CCT / CRI depend on the coating used, sometimes in COBs (Chip on Board) red LEDs are added to boost the CRI.

Blue Light Hazard:
Light/Radiation is not good for eyes, but dosage makes poison. Modern Incandescent Lamps/Fluorescent/HID Lamps have effective UV Block Coating and blue light is generated there in low dosage by design, but especially Fluorescent and HID might be blue light hazard. LEDs in general lighting mess with us on several levels. Their peak at 450 nm messes with our chronobiology and the the blue light causes more cell damage. Incandescent Lamps and daylight have a more uniform distributed spectrum and our bodies were designed for latter. So nothing compares actually to daylight and it is far from understood what light controls in our body (e.g. we now know about 12 different functional spectra in our organism, from seeing, to chronobiology, to cell regeneration).

Lifetime:
In general the lifetime of a LED is superior, but LED Lamps used on mains are complicated beasts and have a lot more components which might die long before the LEDs. Also LEDs don't like to be driven outside their designed range. They will degrade fast when

Re:Some insights on lighting

[Anonymous Coward]

LED lights hurt my eyes.

LED bulbs do not last long

[Anonymous Coward]

Most LED bulbs you can find do not last long. I replaced about 30 lights in the backyard (accent lights) with new LED (2W and 3W). 12 of those failed within 6 months.

In some cases, you need dimmable LED. If you do not have dimmers specially made for LED, you will here constant buzzing noise. LED dimmer switches are very very expensive. Replacement of the dimmer switches to LED need electrician's labor. So straight replacement is not always good.

Heat is often not wasted, savings are far less.

[Anonymous Coward]

For the UK, in the warmer months of the year one uses much less lighting, except for houses with window-light issues. And it's only in those months that the heating is turned off that the heat from bulbs is wasted; where one is heating the air yet it's warm enough already.

The heat in winter-time just adds to the heat of the house. So for gas users that's a reduction of 1/3rds in the savings. For electricity users: no saving at all.

I believe the savings estimates don't take real-world usage into consideration.

Can't we just shut down Portugal instead?

[zwarte piet]

It only makes sense, no?

Why bother?

[sabbede]

This; "consumer savings of up to 112 pound ($144) a year from the switchover because LEDs last much longer than halogens and use far less power", means the market will drive out most halogens on its own. A legislative ban will probably end up making things worse.