Posted on 01/31/2007 8:05:18 AM PST by Jean S
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — It may soon be lights out for the traditional light bulb in California.
Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, D-Van Nuys, is proposing that the Golden State become the first to ban sales of incandescent light bulbs, by 2012. In their place, Californians could purchase more energy-efficient compact fluorescent lamps. Those are the spiral-shaped bulbs that cost more upfront but save money and energy over the long haul. Switching light bulbs is an idea that environmentalists have long supported. But getting consumers to embrace change has been slow going.
Banning energy-intensive incandescents "saves consumers money, saves the state money and saves energy," said Levine, who calls his measure the "How Many Legislators Does it Take to Change a Light Bulb Act."
But, "when a consumer is standing in a store and they're confronted with two different products, they generally opt for the one that is cheaper and the one they've traditionally bought," he said. "The problem is: The one they think is cheaper is only cheap at that moment in time. The other one is cheaper over the long run."
The compact fluorescent bulbs cost several times more than a traditional bulb, but they last 10 times as long. Replacing just one bulb that's used for four to eight hours a day can save a consumer $4 to $13 a year and $38 to $72 after five years, according to the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesargus.com ...
I have first hand experience with the "better" bulbs they are describing.
A client of mine is an ardent enviro. He purchased these bulbs for every fixture in his small- 20 x 20 office where 3 or 4 people worked on engineering details and bookkeeping. They cost upwards of $7 each. None of them lasted for even a year, and they were only on from about 8:15 am to 5 PM, mostly in the winter months. He could be a real tightwad about the power bill, discarding the impending blindness of employees.
By any measure, these bulbs definately did NOT last longer. I don't know if they truly lowered the power bill, as he would selectively turn lights on/off, so I couldn't get a handle on a cross measurement. I do know the $7 bul;bs were purchased far oftened than I do at home, where I often had lights on for over 16 hours at a stretch, doing bookkeeping for my clients.
I think changing over should totally be voluntary. If the government can dictate what light bulbs we have, where does it end? This cannot be a Homeland Security issue. This is just a control issue. More stupidity out of Kalifornia.
Wanna bet me that most of the lights in traffic control are the old style? How about them being changed? OH- right- not bright enough to meet "their standards".
Buy two 7 1/2 round mags..../s
That chart's pretty old. You can get a CFL for under $5 these days. But for comparison let's use that. A cheap incandescent might last you 750 hours. You've already bought about 10 bulbs for the one CFL (8,000 hour life) at a price of about $2.50. So just bulb buying you're already up to half the cost of a CFL.
Now we have to account for your other $2.50. 8,000 hours of incandescent at 100W is 800 kHh. 8,000 hours of approximate CFL is 184 kWh. Difference is 616 kWh. Depending on your electricity cost, that can be anywhere from $37 to $234, with an average of just over $65. Now subtract the $2.50 and you get about $63.
That's $63 per bulb over about five years (using it about 5 hours a day), or about $13 saved per year per bulb. How many bulbs do you have? I've replaced (very rough estimate) 800W worth of incandescent with CFL, which puts me around $100 per year saved. That's like running my electric water heater for almost three months for free.
I can see it now...the state police rounding up Walmart managers for stocking incandescents and ignoring illegal aliens/terrorists...
What are they planning as a substitute for the incandescent bulb? Fluorescent.
California is already the fruitcake state with unreasonable restrictions on chemicals and waste. Do you think they know that a fluorescent bulb has MERCURY in it in order to make it work?
Save me as much as $72 per bulb after 5 years?
If the bulbs last only 4 months each,(which they did at a client's office) that is 3 bulbs a year for 5 years = 15 bulbs @ $7 ea= $105 over 5 years, which puts me $27 into the hole for EACH light fixture I am putting a bulb into. I just counted 35 regular lights in this house, a twin bulb flourescent lamp, 2 small mini bulb reading lamps, and the "can lights" in the kitchen=10. 45 lights over 5 years @ a loss of $27 eash would cost me $1215 total, which is far more than one month of soc sec money I currently collect. The math just doesn't work.
Besides, where is all this production going to come from?
Kalifornia needs to get out of people private lives. No wonder residents are fleeing.
Years ago they used to smuggle magarine into Wisconsin."
I remember that!!!
Dimmer ones are available, but they're more expensive.
Good for the garage, not for the living room.
I'm the exact opposite. I want the garage instant-on (I go in and out a lot), so CFL isn't good for me there.
But as you said, that's why we love the free market.
Reading a book under incandescent bulb is the only way to go. Soft, warm, defused and really easy on the eyes, and most important (at least to me) is they do not glare off some types of paper. "
I had forgotten that for over 35 years, I had to have a special coating on my glasses because of working long hours under flourescent lights. That coating cost alot of money. My last pair of glasses, I declined it because I am basically retired. That saved me $165 on one pair of glasses....
I guess the free health insurance they want all Kalifornians to get will them cover the eye strain from the required type of bulb they are recommending. More money drain..... SIGH...
Second:
The life expectancy claims made by the manufacturers seem to be highly exagerated. I have never had one florescent bulb last 7 years in order to amortize the added expense of them towards the "energy savings".
What are your opinions on these lamps?
Can expel the PRK from the Union then declare war on it?
How does the world's sixth largest economy come up with such stupid ideas?
They also forgot that since fluorescent fixtures depend of vaporizing a small amount of mercury, they will not work below certain temperatures easily achieveable in many parts of the USA (including parts of northern california).
Walmart is going green....with GE. Their goals is to sell 100 million CFLs.
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/08/walmart_to_sell.php
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/108/open_lightbulbs.html
Remember when Bush went on TV post-Katrina when the gas lines/gouging in Georgia were going out of control? And within minutes people started "conserving."
He should have held up one of these bulbs during his SOTU speech...they would have sold out the next day. I have a three pack from GE sitting at home...I am waiting for something else to burn out to use them.
And how about heat lamps? Street lamps (mercury vapor and halide lamps still have a filament in them)
Libs and socialist controlers advancing on all fronts, compelled lighting, Fairness Doctrine, cut and run, global warming, carbon swapping, ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
They can state all they want that the life of the CFL bulb is 8,000 hours. It absolutely isn't in my experience. If they lasted 6 months, I was surprised, most of them were gone in 4-5 months. 8,ooo hours would be almost the equivilant of 4 full work years, assuming the lights were turned off for the lunch period, as everyone was gone from my client's office. NO WAY...
I don't know what kind of "testing" was done, but the bulbs he paid $7 for did not last anywhere near 8,000. I think someone slipped a zero somehwere. More like 800 hours in our usage experience. I won't use them.
Why is there such a push to keep "fixing what isn't broken"?????
The millions of illegal intruders from south of the border are using far more power than any change in light bulbs would even put a dent into. Get them out.
I don't like them, either. The light is harsh and hard on the eyes. Looks like they want to do to light bulbs what they did to toilets - force us to go backwards and use a product that doesn't work as well.
Looks like they want to do to light bulbs what they did to toilets - force us to go backwards and use a product that doesn't work as well."
Right on! Another of my favorite topics. Do any of these recent "graduates from college" think that Mr Kohler didn't do alot of experimenting with how much water a toilet needed to take care of "business"????
I have a low capacity toilets in my house, and I am constantly flushing them 2 and sometimes 3 times to get everything to go where it should. I gnash my teeth again and again over this topic.
I like those spiral bulbs, but I don't want anyone making me buy them. If this passes, next you'll have someone saying they need to raise taxes so they can purchase these more expensive bulbs for the 'poor and needy.'
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