The Conservative Green Plan - Stupid Idea #1
Replacing incandescent light bulbs with lower power alternatives is a good idea. Banning them when the best alternative currently available is a compact fluorescent is very bad public policy. There are two reasons for this.
First, compact fluorescent bulbs each contain approximately 5 milligram of elemental mercury vapour. As I'm sure you are aware, mercury is highly toxic. If you break one in your house there is some risk to you. It could be very expensive to clean up.
Second - try getting a fluorescent bulb to light up outside at -30°C... they don't work very well cold - so you will still need incandescent bulbs outdoors - of course if they are illegal it could jsut be very dark.
Here's to hoping light emitting diode technology gets cheap and easier to produce very quickly.
First, compact fluorescent bulbs each contain approximately 5 milligram of elemental mercury vapour. As I'm sure you are aware, mercury is highly toxic. If you break one in your house there is some risk to you. It could be very expensive to clean up.
Second - try getting a fluorescent bulb to light up outside at -30°C... they don't work very well cold - so you will still need incandescent bulbs outdoors - of course if they are illegal it could jsut be very dark.
Here's to hoping light emitting diode technology gets cheap and easier to produce very quickly.
posted by Technical Bard | 17:06
1 Comments:
The media is misleading people into believing that all incandescents will be banned.
In fact, the government is NOT BANNING INCANDESCENTS. What they are doing however is setting energy efficiency standards for light bulbs, where only bulbs under a certain wattage will be available for purchase.
Incandescents will still be around as long as they are under a certain wattage and for certain special applications (oven lights, chandeliers etc.).
Furthermore, incandescent makers now have until 2012 to come out with new energy efficient bulbs (which GE is rumored to do soon).
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