Compact fluorescent bulbs: Yet another con. Just like ethanol.

[chaska]

Well, this was news to me. And it's kind of a biggie. http://www.richsoil.com/CFL-fluorescent-light-bulbs.jsp

Luckily, I didn't throw out my incandescents (I continue to use them (until they die) in the winter - they produce a lot of heat to warm the house, the light is essentially free).

Hey, people let's just skip the CFLs and go straight to LEDs, okay?

I can't hang around today, I hope you all will keep this kicked. This is kind of important.

[Shagbark Hickory]

1. Reminds me of low-flow faucets

They use a third of the water but it takes 3 times longer to rinse your ass off.

[Fla_Democrat]

50. Shower heads

have a disk inside them, plastic, with a little hole in the center to restrict water flow. I have known of people to take a sharp pen knife, a drill bit, a screw driver, and enlarge the hole. I hear they are much more efficient (time wise, at least) after the minor 'improvement'. :evilgrin:









:smoke:

[aquart]

2. K&R VERY informative.

[Henryman]

16. The article is filled with BS science. Author must have an agenda.

[chaska]

66. A permaculture forum ... those damned wingers. Jesus, you conspiracy idiots take the cake.

[drm604]

3. A bunch of misdirection and bad arguments.

The whole point in using CFLs is to save energy, and thus reduce carbon emissions. The fact is that they do use less energy than incandescents.

This article avoids the whole question of whether or not they save energy, and instead concentrates on cost savings and bulb life, these are different questions.

The mercury argument is bogus. Yes they do contain mercury. Yes, if they are not recycled properly they release mercury into the environment. Burning coal also releases mercury into the environment. By using fluorescents, less coal is burned and therefore less coal related mercury enters the environment. This results in a net reduction in mercury release because the amount released by the bulbs (even if they're not recycled properly) is less than the amount that is not released by the extra coal that is not burned.

[SidDithers]

30. Good post...

:thumbsup:

A 13W CFL uses less than a quarter of the energy of a 60W incandescent. And the newer, warmer colouring CFL's are virtually indistinguishable from incandescents, in lighting quality (at least to my eyes).

Then only thing I don't like, is the warm up time on the G25 globe style CFL's in my bathrooms. They will take up to a minute to reach full brightness on those cold winter mornings.

Sid

[dionysus]

61. vaht? if the ODS people, make us switch the... light bulbs.. VE SHHTRIKE!!

because we're tough... as nails...

[trotsky]

32. But can you find fault with this awesome graph?

Who needs units?!?

[SidDithers]

34. That's a bloody awesome graph...

and has completely changed my opinion about the article in the OP.

Sid

[drm604]

39. Yea, I suppose if you don't care about units

then my argument is pretty much beaten into the ground.

And they do have a Mythbusters link. Don't they automatically get 10 points just for having that?

[Tesha]

47. Showing the incandescent as "level" is also incorrect.

Primarily as a result of "bulb blackening", conventional
incandescent lamps lose brightness over their life as
well. It's more-true for lamps burned "base down" than
for lamps burned "base-up"; the blackening mostly affects
the top-most part of the lamp so if that's the base, it's
less of an effect than if the glass globe is the part
being blackened. But either way, it's not insignificant.
This same evaporation of the tungsten filament also causes
the resistance of the filament to rise, decreasing the
light output as well.

FYI: tungsten-halogen lamps don't experience either aspect
of this effect.

Tesha

[geardaddy]

4. Is that you Michele Bachmann?

j/k.

[chaska]

67. Is that you, Forest?

[KamaAina]

5. Fluorescent lighting sucks

Some Autistic people (not me, praise FSM) can actually see the 60Hz flicker in fluorescent lights. It's like going to school (or whatever) in a carnival funhouse with strobe lights. This explains quite a bit of kids' tantrumming. :(

I also wonder if it might not affect everyone on more of a subliminal level. How tired are you when you leave the office at 5, even if you haven't really done all that much?

[Shagbark Hickory]

6. I think the light they emit is a depressing hospitalesque shade of light.

So add depressing to the list.

[TexasProgresive]

10. Did you ever see that old Tom Hanks?Meg Ryan movie

Joe vs. The Volcano?

Joe was convinced the fluorescent light in his work place were making him sick- So he brought a cowboy kids lamp from home.

[SidDithers]

31. It's a brain cloud...

:rofl:

Hadn't thought of that movie in years :)

Sid

[drm604]

11. There's a 60Hz flicker in fluorescent lights but not in incandescents?

Are you sure about that? They both use the same 60Hz AC.

[Fumesucker]

13. The incandescents work by getting hot...

The filament doesn't cool much during the neutral crossing part of each cycle, 120 times per second.

With sensitive detectors you can see a flicker in an incandescent but it's much too small for the human eye to see.

[drm604]

19. I understand how they work, I just didn't think about the cooling time,

but that does make sense.

I would have thought that any flicker from a fluorescent is, as you say, to quick for the human eye, but apparently some people do claim they can see it. I'm skeptical of that claim but I can't say for certain.

[Fumesucker]

33. It's not the frequency of the flicker I was talking about, it's the depth of the light curve..

The variation in light output with an incandescent is very small, a shallow light curve, the pulsations come at the same frequency though.

I suspect LED lights have a lot of flicker too. I'm not sure they have circuitry to smooth out the 120 Hz pulsations from the power line.

An LED light would have a very pronounced bright dim cycle at 120 Hz without such circuitry. It's generally accepted that 120 Hz is too fast to see but there are situations where it can be sensed by most people if the light curve is deep enough.

[krispos42]

17. I think that the temp of the filament only varies a tiny bit between cycles

AC voltage peaks at 170, I believe... 120 is the average. Since the light is created directly by heating the filament, the light can only change by changing the temperature.

Fluorescent uses some kind of gas discharge effect to irradiate the phosphors on the tubes; I presume it's tuned to the same cycle as the input voltage.

[Obamanaut]

41. The flicker you see is the bulb sucking up dark. They don't really emit

light. When they finally stop working it is because they have absorbed all the dark they will hold.

The bulbs will last longer if the screw base is downward, causing the dark to fall into the brass base where it stays until full.





edited to add: Not really. :evilgrin:

[cherokeeprogressive]

53. I am absolutely speechless. n/t

[krispos42]

12. I can sense it sometimes, out of the corner of my eye.

The wall or whatever will seem to shimmer.


Of course, I was running a fan the the basement last week to dry it out (Irene) and the room was lit by a 2-watt LED lightbulb. They were both plugged into the generator, so the LED was used to a) light the basement, and b) let us know the breaker hadn't tripped.

I noticed that the white fan blades had a bit of a stroboscopic effect on them in the LED light, although this might simply have been because the RPM of the fan was harmonizing with my retinas.

[Tesha]

48. It's a good thing that fluorescents don't flicker at 60 Hz then.

Unless the lamp is at the end of its life and "rectifying",
no fluorescent flickers at 60 Hz; they flicker at twice
the line frequency so 120 Hz in the US and 100 Hz in most
of the rest of the world.

And a lot of CFLs (and essentially all modern non-compact
fluorescent lamps equipped with an electronic ballast) are
flickering far, far faster (many KHz); *NO ONE* can see those
lamps flicker under any circumstances.

Tesha

[Rabblevox]

7. Yup, you need to look at the "downstream" on ANY "Eco-friendly" solution...

Ethanol has proven to be a horridly inefficient fuel source, and while people are starving, turning food into gasoline is abhorrent.

Bio-diesel is slightly better, but not by much.

I was initially attracted to compact fluorescents, until I dug into the downstream. Yes, they use less energy and will reduce net electrical costs, but the amount of mercury they add to the waste-stream is staggering.

Candles and horses, people.

[Shagbark Hickory]

9. RE: mercury...

What do you have to say to reply #3, last paragraph?

[Rabblevox]

18. I'm not a scientist, so I have to say "I don't know", and my region gets it's power from Hydro, ...

not coal. So maybe I'm biased. (and maybe I'm ignorant)but I maintain that you need to look at the entire life-stream of a product to gauge how "Green" it is.

[Shagbark Hickory]

21. One could also make the case that because they're heavier and probably manufactured overseas..,

there is more a carbon footprint with transporting those. Just transporting.

[Rabblevox]

23. good point. but this is starting to make my head hurt. I'm gonna turn off my CF lights...

and go to the park. (where I will probably get skin cancer).

Oh well

[Shagbark Hickory]

25. Well be sure to use sun block. Of course the plasticizers in the bottle of sunblock might poison u

too. :shrug:

[Rabblevox]

28. "it's always something" but at least in Portland, we've needed very little sun-block this year. /nt

[Shagbark Hickory]

43. Oh then that must have extended the Seasonal Affective Disorder for a lot of folks then.

[Tesha]

49. So drop them off in the bin at your local home center marked "CFL Recycling".

Then they add virtually zero mercury to the waste stream.

Tesha

[FSogol]

8. You think it is more efficient to heat your house with light bulbs than your normal heat pump/

furnace/wood stove?

:rofl:

[chaska]

65. You're a fucking moron. You should learn to read....

and think.

[supraTruth]

14. I agree.

[Warren Stupidity]

15. hmmm... our town is currently saving around 40K/yr by switching.

So I guess I am a bit dubious about your link.

[GreenPartyVoter]

20. If you don't like CFLs, try LEDs instead.

[gulliver]

45. That's where it is going.

Soon too. Dimmable, much better working life than CFLs, better looking light, and better for the environment. It's all over. The price is going to come down big time in the next couple of years too. The demise of both CFLs and incandescents can't happen too soon for me.

[Robb]

22. Almost no one takes advantage, but the installation cost could be less if lower-wattage bulbs

...were mandated. My dad and I were kicking this thought around a few years back.

If you use a 25-watt CFL (or LED) where you might normally use a 100-watt bulb, you could have more four times as many bulbs on the same circuit safely -- use less copper, lower the cost of wiring material, lower the cost of wiring the house or other structure.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

55. Yep. I installed 10 CREE LED recessed retros(65 watt equivalent 10.5 actual) in my buddy's kitchen.

I probably would have added a circuit if not for the LEDs.

We just installed 20 more in my house. We love 'em. 11 more to go when the budget allows.

[Coyote_Bandit]

24. I'm vision impaired

The CFLs are awful. They emit a blue light spectrum which make it more difficult for me to see than an incandescent light with comparable lumens and a yellow light spectrum.

I'm long-term unemployed so paying $20or so for a single LED light - and that is what they are retailing for here at the big box stores - is out of the question.

I live in a small old house and will likely have to replace a number of fixtures when I can no longer get incandescent bulbs for them. Neither the CFL's or LED's that are currently available fit the fixtures.

My old home has the laundry and hot water tank in the garage. While it is insulated, the garage is not heated. Last winter when the temperature dropped to 20 below I was able to leave a couple of incandescent bulbs on in the garage overnight and use the heat generated by the bulbs to hold the temperature in the upper 30's. That's a whole hell of a lot safer than running an unattended space heater for hours.

Yeah, I'm stockpiling lightbulbs. For some of us the issues and practical concerns go far beyond environmental protection.

[Shagbark Hickory]

26. And if you think the blue light is bad on CFLs just wait til you see the LEDs.

Very blue.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

56. Not the new 65 watt equivalent recessed can retrofits from CREE.

We installed 20 retrofits in our can housings. I can't tell the difference except when they are dimmed all the way down to almost zero - then they get a little of a fluorescent look. Not blue at all.




I did once return some under cabinet LEDs I purchased to replace our halogen puck lights. They were, in fact, too blue. We went with xenons for the alleged longer life expectancy. They burn out just like the halogens we had.

[drm604]

27. I would think (I would hope!) that there would be some sort of health exemption

for people in your circumstance. If not, maybe you need to start pushing for one.

[Fumesucker]

37. The CFL lamps have different spectra..

They aren't all that blue white color, I have four, three of them are warm white and the last one is blue white.

I actually like the slow turn on of the CFL lamps, I don't like a sudden blaze of light when my eyes are thoroughly dark adapted, it's painful. A little slower warm up is much more comfortable.

[emmadoggy]

40. There are warm white (yellow) CFL's available. They are very comparable to

an incandescent. We've been using them for several years. Also, there are some very small mini size bulbs available that fit in most any fixture. We have some CFL's that are a 60W equivalent that are smaller than a standard 60W bulb. These bulbs are very commonly available and not very expensive (our energy company also offers rebates for CFL purchases).

For your garage, I can understand using the incandescents, but I would encourage you to check out the CFL's again. Just be sure to watch the labels for "warm white" or "cool white" or compare the lumens to an incandescent. And look for the mini size bulbs - I have seen them in both the Feit brand and Sylvania, in places like Walmart, Menards, Home Depot etc.

They really do make a noticeable difference on your electric bill.

[Coyote_Bandit]

52. Thanks

I have not seen any warm white CFLs. But we don't have Menards here, I don't frequent Walmart and I usually prefer a local hardware store to the box stores. I will go out to one of the big box stores and see if I can find them.

A 60W equivalent does not produce enough light with my vision impairment. I really need a 75 or 100 W equivalent if I am going to do much of anything besides watch tv or work on the computer.

I'm not opposed to using less energy and having a lower electric bill. But my lighting needs are a bit different than those of most people. And I am opposed to having to replace fixtures. Pricing is a concern as well.

[emmadoggy]

54. I understand. Just trying to help if I can.

My local hardware store doesn't have much of a selection of CFL's. The big stores have a much better variety. Shame, but that's the way it is.

I'm not sure if the 75's or 100's would work for you since even the mini versions of those are still fairly large, but it may be worth checking into just to see for sure.



:hi:

[iris27]

29. Ugh, no thanks, the light quality/color of LEDs is even worse than that of CFLs!

Wouldn't it make more sense just to turn lights off when they're not being used than tinker with all these different forms of lighting? I can't imagine we garner much savings from the one table lamp that is turned on in our living room for about 4 hours each evening, or the 2-5 minute spurts the lights may be on in the bathroom or laundry room.

[Tesha]

51. Switching over to mostly CFLs in all of our "long on-time" fixtures...

...led to a very noticeable drop in our electric bill.

There's a knock-on effect that for that part of the year
when you're air-conditioning, the CFL not only uses much
less electricity itself but it also emits much less heat
for the air conditioning unit to remove (at the cost of
more electricity).

Even in the winter, gas heat is far less expensive than
the "electric heat" provided by incandescent light bulbs.

Tesha

[iris27]

57. Ok. We have mostly cfl's but noticed no real drop when we switched. I guess we just don't

have the lights on often enough.

[Tesha]

58. That's quite possible!

There are lights where it doesn't make any sense to switch because
they simply aren't run enough or the "on-time" is very short. For
example, all of our closet lights are still incandescent because the
daily run-time on each is somewhere between zero and five
minutes.

(We're about to experiment with an LED light bar in one commonly-
used closet.)

Tesha

[FarCenter]

35. Reliability seems to vary a lot by brand

Some of the cheap ones at the big box store don't last very long in frequently switched applications.

Others have much better life.

That said, I'd like to see the price of LEDs come down and replace CFLs.

Meanwhile, for fixtures that are on for long periods, go with conventional tube florescents.

[Xithras]

36. Motion sensing light switches are often a better solution.

I've posted long diatribes about my distaste for CFL's before, but don't feel like doing so today. Suffice it to say, I converted my entire house to CFL's several years ago. Today, except in some utility-light situations like my garage, I've converted completely back to incandescents. The light was bothering my eyes, the bulb lifespan was never anywhere near what they advertised, and I had one explode (never EVER buy a Phillips Dimmable CFL Flood...worst bulb ever).

Last year I went through my house and swapped most of the light switches out, replacing them with IR occupancy sensors (Luton Maestro's with integrated dimmers). The lights in my home now automatically turn themselves off when the rooms are unoccupied, and the integrated dimmers allow us to run the bulbs at lower power settings even when they ARE on.

My home now uses LESS electricity than it did when I was using all-CFL's. The savings is enough so that the switches will have paid for themselves by the end of this year (about a year and a half after their installation). That's pretty impressive, since the CFL's NEVER paid for themselves before burning out.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

62. I thought about using motion sensors.

I wonder how they work when a person is sitting MOSTLY still like watching TV or typing on the internets?

Do you have any issues with the lights shutting off when you are in the room? I suppose one could always wave an arm but I'm concerned that might get old.

We just switched 20 recessed can lights to the new CREE 65 watt equivalent. We love 'em. You can't tell the difference.

We have six lights LED in the kitchen (see below). I would think the motion detector would be perfect there as one is always moving in the kitchen. And maybe even better for the halogens under cabinet.

The LEDs in the kitchen use 10.5 watts for a total of 63 watts versus 65 times 6 += 390.

[Xithras]

63. I don't have that problem.

As I understand it, that was a problem with some of the first models a decade ago, but quality occupancy sensors today are sensitive enough to detect the motion of your chest when you're breathing. There are models from other manufacturers that don't use motion at all, but instead detect body heat. Modern switches are incredibly accurate. The only time I've ever had a light switch off is when I'm under a table or something, completely out of sight of the sensor. You quickly learn to anticipate these, and just have to hold the button a moment to override the sensor (If you hold the button for a few seconds, the light just stays on like a normal switch).

FWIW, your kitchen is similar to mine, though I have eight recessed lights. I really liked the CFL floods when I installed them in there as well, but they didn't last. The first burned out only a few months after installing it. I replaced them all when the sixth burned out, only a year after putting them in. The problem is that CFL's don't like heat, and recessed light fixtures typically have poor ventilation and the air inside of them gets VERY hot. This is also why you have to get special Insulation Contact rated cans when installing in a top floor...the recessed cans can actually get hot enough to start fires. This heat can completely destroy the electronics in the base of the bulb, in a matter of months.

My Phillips CFL flood actually got hot enough that the glue holding the glass globe in place let loose while my wife was making dinner. The globe broke the light coil inside as it let go, giving us a great momentary fireball, and then shattered into a million pieces when the glass from both bulb parts hit the floor a second later.

Heat is death for a CFL, and recessed lights are one of the hottest fixtures you can put them in. The fact that you have to install the CFL upside-down, so that the electronics are sitting in the hottest part of the can, directly above the heat source, just makes it that much worse. They look great when they're new, but they don't last.

[Name removed]

38. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Poiuyt]

42. Please sign this petition to keep incandescent lighting available

http://irlen.com/index.php?s=news

I work with students with dyslexia and they tend to have trouble with fluorescent lights. Fluorescent and LED bulbs have a flicker and an incomplete spectrum that can cause headaches and reading distortions. And yes, I've been hoarding incandescent bulbs for my office where I tutor.

[Mosby]

44. All I know is picking out a light bulb should not be this complicated.

[NNN0LHI]

46. Fox's "Light Bulb Ban" Does Not Exist

http://mediamatters.org/research/201101040005

January 04, 2011 9:00 am ET

Since the Energy Independence and Security Act was passed in 2007, right-wing media have claimed that it will outlaw incandescent light bulbs. In fact, the bill, signed by President Bush, only sets standards for light bulbs and does not ban all incandescent bulbs, only inefficient ones.

Perino, Varney Claim There Is A "Ban" On "Incandescent Light Bulbs"

Perino Refers To "Ban Of Incandescent Light Bulbs," Suggests Consumers Will Be Forced To Buy "Pigtails" {CFL} Bulbs. During the January 3 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends, the co-hosts brought on Fox News contributor Dana Perino to discuss her comments on the Energy and Independence Security Act of 2007 in The Washington Post. During the segment, she claimed that the bill included a "ban on incandescent light bulbs." From the show:

Bill Does Not Force Sale of CFL Light Bulbs

Star Tribune: Bill "Doesn't Mean You Will Be Forced To Use CFLs To Light Your House." An April 2010 post on a Star Tribune blog noted that "{t}here is no ban on incandescent light bulbs" and further explained:

The word "ban" isn't {in the bill}. What is there, is a set of standards for making light bulbs more efficient phased in from 2012 to 2014.

Look carefully and you'll also see a whole list of exceptions including: 3-way light light bulbs, 40-watt appliance bulbs and other specialty bulbs, 22 exceptions in all.

O.k., so the bill doesn't say "ban," but many claim that the standards effectively bans incandescent, because light bulbs today can't meet them. So we're being forced to buy compact fluorescent lights (CFLs).

That's not exactly right, either.

[snooper2]

59. How many different handles does Laura Ingram have on DU?

:shrug:

[Hassin Bin Sober]

60. Yep. Just witnessed the same thing on the U.S. Postal Service thread.

[chaska]

64. Idiot.