Re: OT Re: CFLs - retrofitting low ESR capacitors

"Trevor Wilson"

** OTOH - the amounts used to make one light bulb are tiny and so use tiny amounts of energy. ** They can last 100 years in low or no use.

They often outlast CFLs in actual service.

** Bollocks.

** Per lamp, it is far MORE than an incandecsent. ** Absolute LIE.

Each CFLs use 50 times time more energy to make, plus a large amount of poisonous chemical waste and then consume more energy too - if they last their rated life.

Then they pollute the planet with Mercury and other heavy metal poisons.

No such issues with incandescents.

It is all a massive LIE .

... Phil

I don't have actual figures, Trevor, but it makes sense that making a thin glass spherical envelope for an incandescent, is unlikely to use more energy than making a thick-walled tube wound into a convoluted double spiral. Many of the other items contained in a CFL, also use very energy intensive processes, and have to be carried out in many different factories, which then brings the costs of moving workers around, keeping them warm and fed, moving raw materials around, moving finished components around, and so on. Just because all of these things are 'hidden', it doesn't make them any less relevant. Looked at rationally, given the amount of components and manufacturing processes involved, I would have thought that the simple incandescent bulb, with its very few parts, consumed nothing like as much energy overall to get from nothing to working in my house. Bear in mind also, that very long-lived incandescents are available, and always were. Its just that they cost more, and are not in the financial interests of the bulb manufacturers, to promote.

Arfa

You really are a blue ribbon simpleton, Trev.

When computers were being introduced for home use, other forms of communication and/or creativity weren't banned.

I recall the "proposed" huge benefits of widespread computer use were going to include:

-dramatically reduce paper usage and eliminate the necessity of an infinite number of forms. Then eveyone started buying printers for every reason imaginable, and using computers to create and generate more forms. Products with no real value.. phone books, magazines, catalogs.. still paper, although many are digitized.

-reduce the size of government since there wouldn't be a need for as many people to move around all those forms that would no longer be paper. Didn't see that happen either.

-records will be more secure. Hogwash.. after many disasters, there are reports of lost records which aren't archived elsewhere.

Computers have increased corporate profits, but have done little to make everyday life more comfortable or convenient for the people inhabiting the planet. Well, then there are the smart people that create a letterhead and a worthless organization based upon their own misguided adgendas, to leech money from others for a good cause.

-Make much more effective the use of our time (don't care for the "save time" hoax, kinda like products that pay for themselves). Yet everywhere people need to get in a line for a purchase or service, there are still always lines and peope waiting. Daily encounters with computers aren't really faster and more efficient, they're actually more complicated.

You keep yapping about silicon, yet there are no reasons people die from silicon.

Mercury, gallium arsenide and other toxic elements are actually contained within new lighting technologies, but not in incandescent lamps. Maybe you should start yapping about argon.

You might actually believe that "regulators ensure that the pollution created is dealt with appropriately". This is partially true, and generally always after the pollution has taken place (often for a long time without detection), after the fact, and the cleanup costs are generally always put on the citizens. The fines are generally only symbolic.

You seem to think that someone should be impressed with the dozen-or-so lighting devices you've commented on. Your experience (real or not) is completely insignificant in the lighting industry which includes hundreds of millions/billions of lighting devices sold every year.

The incidence of failure of products from China is higher than it's ever been for many of the people alive today. Many of these products don't even function when new. The race to the bottom as far as product quality goes, is based upon greed. Very few products are manufactured today that are intended to last for 10 years, and that means very few consumer electronic devices.. of which many don't last 2 years.

What this means is that your 10 year old LED example isn't even relative in today's manufacturing practices. The throw-away-society arrived while you weren't paying attention. All that trash needs to go somewhere. How many times can a $40 VCR be fixed?

So you go right ahead and get in line for those new, high quality, 10 year life, $50 LED lighting devices.. then spend your time repairing them. You're savig the planet and contributing to humanitarian causes. There oughta be an award for that, Oh.. there is, it's called an inflated ego.

I don't dispute that an LED can last 10 years, only that in the present manufacturing environment, a 40-100W LED lamp is going to be manufactured to fail. I have a lot of LED flashlights and portable lights and they work great for seeing in the dark, or signaling such as panel indicators, but piss poor at illuminating a room.

With LED flashlights, they seem to produce a lot of light when surrounded by darkness, but they don't "throw" light very well at all.. and the reflector becomes more important than the miniscule light source. Reflectors take space, which defeats making a device compact.

Unless you live like people did in the early 1900s with one dim lamp per room, LED home lighting is going to be very costly, both in terms of early failures and replacing fixtures which won't accomodate the new designs. Might also be a good time to change all interior items to white.. white floors, walls, furniture, etc.

LED lighting might be great for a camper/caravan with 12V lighting circuits, but I suspect there will be lots of problems with adapting 240 or 120VAC to

3V. Power supplies introduce losses, spike/surge suppressors add to final cost.

Has anyone discovered a metal as good as/better than gold for those tiny leads attached to LED (and IC) chips? When gold loses it's value, LEDs will become cheaper to produce.

You keep parroting that incandescent lamps have short or extremely short lifespans, which could be true of the cheap examples you bought, but they don't cost anywhere near $50 each and aren't hazardous waste to end up in the ground near water supplies. BTW, many thread bases of light bulbs today are aluminum, as are the threaded sockets in many fixtures.

Incandescent light bulb costs have traditionally (for generations now) been insignificant in the annual budget of home maintenance.. but that is going to change, significantly.

Maybe everyone will need to keep a drawer/cupboard full of LED lamps to insure their homes aren't dangerous to move around in.. cha-ching!

I'm not exaggerating my experiences with CFLs, but I can tell ya that a 10 year life for CFLs is not average or even close to common.

Almost all of my CFLs are/have been mounted base-down in open/ventilated metal reflectors.. I've had 3 go into catastrophic failure, turning red hot before I could react quickly to shut them off. The only warning was a few blinks just prior to the failures.

You were the one that initiated the question of proof so I just played along, because I knew your response was predictable. I've presented proof.. these are my opinions.. no, seriously. They weren't composed by some marketing firm.

**Irrelevant.. was your answer for how many of those LEDs it takes to illuminate a room. OK.. right.

My comments aren't arguments that my opinions are correct, so you go ahead and argue all you want to.

-- Cheers, WB .............

**Tell you what, d*****ad: Try using some facts and logic to support your arguments and you'll sound like you have a brain. So far, you just sound like an idiot. You use insults in preference to common-sense, logic and hard evidence. I will now give you a chance to redeem yourself. **Blah, blah, blah. We're talking about incandescents, LEDs and CFLs. Stay on topic. **Blah, blah, blah. We're talking about incandescents, LEDs and CFLs. Stay on topic. **Blah, blah, blah. We're talking about incandescents, LEDs and CFLs. Stay on topic. **Blah, blah, blah. We're talking about incandescents, LEDs and CFLs. Stay on topic. **Huh? WTF are you talking about? I merely corrected your idiotic comments about CFLs and LEDs. **So? There are a large range of toxic elements in the computer you are using, in the cell 'phone you may happen to use and just about every other modern device. What's your point? Are you going to cease using your computer? Please do so immediately. Give us a rest your incessant twaddle and idiotic top-posting.

There are harmful chemicals in a great many products. Those chemicals need to be dealt with correctly and appropriately.

**Then why don't YOU start by not using your computer? Stop buying lead acid batteries, NiCd batteries, any products that use leaded solder, any products with tantalum capacitors contained within, anything using gold sourced from Papua, petroleum products, anything using plastic, etc, etc. YOU should follow your own advice. **No. I am citing fact. Nothing more. I have not experienced a CFL failure, ever (other than misuse). Of course, I only purchase quality CFLs and I use them correctly. **OK. Then YOU need to provide the data which shows how unreliable quality, correctly operated CFLs are. My anecdotes are EXACTLY as irrelevant as yours. **More twaddle. Some products are good. Some not so good. Just for yuks, I thought I'd test your theory.

In the last 20-odd years, I've used a number of 'walk-about' telephones. A couple were Panasonics, whilst others were from other manufacturers. Except for the one I use right now, all were manufactured in Japan. They all failed. Some last 4 or 5 years and some lasted less than a year. The one I have beside me is 6 years old. It is made in China.

**The nation with the worst reputation for quality (or domestic products) is the USA, not China. Except Cree. **I'll let you know in another ten years. We'll see how long the ones I've recently installed last. **As many times as you like. However, a $100.00 VCR is likely to last MUCH longer than a $1,500.00 VCR manufactured in 1980. **Cite your proof that the LEDs will fail prematurely.

You're savig the planet and contributing to humanitarian

**Prove it.

**You have got to be the most pig-ignorant poster we've seen in quite a long time. Light is light. It can be measured and quantified. **Just when I thought you were speaking complete bollocks, you surpass yourself for abject stupidity. I direct you to a link, which shows what two, identical power consumption torches can do. One is a 3 Watt halogen torch. The other is a 3 Watt LED torch:

In case you have not worked it out, the right hand one is the halogen and the left is the LED. The halogen was fitted with fresh batteries. I charged the Lithium battery in the LED torch a month ago.

Now, please explain WTF you mean by LED torches not being able to "throw" light very well. I can tell you that the torch whose beam you can see in the photo is easily capable of lighting up stuff a couple of hundred Metres away. The halogen doesn't have a snowball's chance in Hell.

**So you keep claiming. Let's see you hard proof of your claims.

Might also be a good time to change all interior items

**Of course. Just like CFLs, there is an extra cost associated with LEDs. However, the MASSIVE increase in efficiency and incredibly long life make up for those issues. **Blah, blah, blah. We're talking about incandescents, LEDs and CFLs. Stay on topic. **A VERY large number of incandescent lamps were/are produced using lead solder. Lead is toxic. And again: Proper disposal should be part of any product's design. That includes CFLs, LEDs and incandescents. **Fortunately, the long life of CFLs and LEDs make that cost irrelevant. However, let's examine that claim:

I use 23 Watt CFLs in a number of locations. They cost around AUS$5.00 each. SO FAR, I have obtained around 3,500 hours of use, at minimal light degradation. I fully expect a life of at least 7,000 ~ 10,000 hours from these lamps. However, let's use the low end figure for calculation: 3,500 hours. $5.00 for 3,500 hours. Total powe4r consumption for that period =

80.5 kW/hours. At (say) $0.20/kW/hr = $16.10. Total running cost = $21.10. In reality, the figure will be somewhat lower.

To replace that 23 Watt CFL, I need to use a (minimum) 100 Watt incandescent (it's really more like 125 Watt, but I'm going easy on you). Let's say the cost of a decent one was AUS$1.00. The BEST one can expect from a 100 lamp is around 500 hours. Let's say 1,000 hours, because I'm feeling generous. You'll need 3.5 lamps to equal one CFL. Total initial cost $3.50. Power consumption for the period is 350kW/hours. At $0.20/kW/hr = $70.00. Total running cost = $73.50.

CFL comfortably nails the incandescent.

My own experience with incandescents suggests that a 100 Watt incandescent will likely last considerably less than 200 hours.

**No need. LED last a very long time. **Then cite your proof. **Stop buying s***ty CFLs. **You have not provided proof. See my photo as something that represents proof and shreds at least one of your dodgy and seriously deluded arguments. **I made no claim that the first generation LEDs that I was using could light a room. **Supply your proof and learn how to post properly.

**Intuitively, that would be a reasonable assumption.

Many of the other items contained in a CFL, also use

**I agree.

**I don't know how much energy is involved with each device, but I'll betcha the energy consumed by the incandescent, over it's entire life vastly exceeds the energy required to manufacture it. The CFL, by comparison, is a massively more efficient device, with a much longer life span. Total energy is likely to be far lower with the CFL. And no, I don't have the data, but I imagine someone has done the maths.

Bear in mind also, that very long-lived incandescents are

**And, they are vastly less efficient. The technology to build long lasting incandescents has been known for a long time - operate them at lower Voltages, or use a carbon filament. Either way, colour temperature sucks and efficiency is way down.

BTW: The discussion also involves LEDs. IMO, CFLs are an interim step. They have far too many drawbacks to be a long term solution. Incandescents are, of course, no solution at all.

But actually, what exactly is the problem that we're trying to find a solution to ? I saw some figures a few weeks ago that said that if every single light bulb in the UK was changed to a CFL, the total saving in energy would amount to the output of one small power station. I suppose that you could argue that any saving is worth having, but I sometimes think that this religion of 'green' has completely overtaken common sense, and in some cases, the disadvantages of a substitute technology such as CFLs, needs to be weighed against the perceived disadvantages of what it's trying to replace. The problem with green technology is that its advocators are often zealots, who seek to portray the alternatives that they are pedaling as the only solution to a problem which often, only they see. They never tell the full story behind these technologies, being selective in the extreme. CFLs are a good example of this, where the *only* aspects that have been promoted, are the fact that they consume less energy for the same amount of light output as an 'equivalent' incandescent - and therein lies a can of worms before we start - and that they are supposedly longer lived. The huge amounts of manufacturing processes, and shipping energy for all the component parts, and all the other hidden energy inputs, are politely ignored. Not to mention the true disposal costs, if this is done properly. No one really understands the real manufacturing costs either, because governments are making sure that the true price is subsidised by collecting additional 'green' taxes via the energy companies, from the likes of you and I. If ever these subsidies are removed, CFLs will become a major expense to a household, unless they use really crappy quality Chinese imports that give poor light quality and poor starting characteristics, and are much shorter lived than people are currently being persuaded is the case.

Arfa

**Let see. Incandescents are:

• Around 5% efficient. At best.

• Have a short life-span.
• Suffer poor colour rendition.

If those problems can be solved, then thast would be a good thing.

I saw some figures a few weeks ago that said that if

**I'll take your word for it. That does not tell the entire story though. For every 100 Watts of incandescent light that can be eliminated, a significant amount of air conditioning costs can be eliminated. There's a very good bunch of reasons why fluoros and other types of discharge lamps are used in every office building, shopping centre and many other places in most nations. They're efficient and they reduce demands on air conditioning. And, consequently, on energy suppliers. Every Watt not dissipated, is a Watt that does not need to be countered with an air conditioner. It adds up.

Having said all that, here in Australia, lighting is far less important than heating, cooling and pool filtering in terms of total energy consumption. Do a Google Earth on Sydney of Brisbane and count the number of pools. Each one uses around 8kWhr of energy every day. Lighting, by comparison is no where near as significant. Mostly. I just came back from a service call at a neighbour's home. Every single part of the home was lit by halogen downlights. These are an incredibly wasteful way to light a home, yet they are very popular. The kitchen, alone had 6 X 50 Watt downlights.

I suppose that you could argue that any saving is worth

**Fair enough, but we have not seen any real data yet. I don't have the data, do you? The idiot who keeps claiming that CFLs are less reliable than incadescents has yet to supply any data.

The problem with green technology is that its advocators are

**IME, they are certainly MUCH longer lived. By a dramatic amount. My sample size is: 19 CFLs. 1 incandescent 12 halogen incandescents

• In six years, none of the CFLs have failed. Several CFLs were transferred from a previous residence and are at least 8 years old. One is operated at least 4 hours per day. Most others see around 1 ~ 1.5 hours per day.

• My non-halogen incandescent has failed twice in 6 years. It's use is severely restricted to less than 1 hour per week.
• The halogen downlights are used around 2 hours per week. I've replaced at least a dozen halogens in the last 6 years.

The huge amounts

**Are they? I'm pretty certain that shipping costs are taken into account. **Not me. Here in Australia, there are no subsidies or special treatment for low energy lamps. Yet. CFLs have been cheap for quite a few years. I pay around 5 Bucks for high quality, 23 Watt, Philips branded lamps. There are MUCH cheaper lamps available, but I don't buy them (anymore). Once bitten, twice shy. If you examine my analysis of the running costs of incandescent vs. CFLs, you'll see why CFLs are a MUCH better choice.

If ever these subsidies are removed, CFLs

**Bollocks. There are no subsidies in Australia and qualility CFLs can be purchased for around 5 Bucks. Given the exceptionally long life and low operating costs, there is simply no comparison.

"Arfa Daily"

** Stop trying to reason with TW.

The guy is one of the biggest all round lunatics and charlatans in Australia.

He never listens and he never changes his views, no matter how wrong he is.

He is utterly autistic.

... Phil

"Arfa Daily" wrote in news:3sveq.9442$ snipped-for-privacy@newsfe22.ams:

the manufacture of CFLs produces much more pollution than making incandescent lamps. it probably outweighs any savings from the use of CFLs over I-lamps. you don't need -any- mercury in making I-lamps,nor do you need phosphors.

"Jim Yanik" wrote in message news:Xns9F687DFAFBEA7jyaniklocalnetcom@216.168.3.44...

Yes. This is kind of my point. And when I was saying that 'background' items like shipping costs are politely ignored, I was referring to the multiple shipping operations that are required for the many components in a CFL, and the many raw materials contained in those components, just to get all the bits and pieces from the individual specialist manufacturers, to the places where the lamps are assembled. In the case of an incandescent lamp, we are talking a few components, simply made from a few raw materials. With a CFL, we are talking semiconductors comprising silicon, dopant chemicals, plastic, metal. Capacitors comprising metal foil, plastic, rubber, maybe paper, metal leads and other chemicals in the electros. Coils comprising processed iron powder, copper wire, insulation, copper foil, epoxy adhesive, steel leadouts. Then there's the complex glass tube, and the chemical phosphors and mercury vapour inside it. Tungsten electrodes. Then the pcb material that its all mounted on. Lots of soldered joints. And then the plastic enclosure for the ballast. And then the 'normal' bits that an incandescent has anyway. Every single one of those components, and the manufacturing processes for *their* component parts, involves energy input for the process. They all need workers who have to be moved from their homes and back again each day, They have to be heated / cooled, fed and watered, and then lit as well. And when they've made their bits of the lamp, these have to be shipped on somewhere else. These are the energy costs that the general public are never made aware of. If they were, they might start to question the perceived wisdom that they've been fed, that these things are actually 'green'.

If people want to use CFLs in the belief - mistaken in my opinion - that they are in some way helping the world to use less energy, then that's fine. If it's really the case, then CFLs will win out the day in the end. But I think that it is utterly wrong that the existing technology has been banned completely on thin evidence and a less than truthful declaration of the energy required to make and dispose of the things, the only factor being pushed, being the lower energy consumption when they are in use, as though this is the be-all and end-all of their right to exist, and to be forced on us.

The point that Trevor makes about aircon to mitigate the heat output of incandescents, holds no water here in Northern Europe. Unlike in Australia, it seldom becomes hot enough up here for more than a few days a year, that aircon is needed. And that is only in the summer, when it's light for 16 hours of the day anyway, so there's not much lighting being used. OTOH, for much of the year, it is cool or cold enough to require heating in houses, and in this case, the complete opposite of Trevor's premise, is true, in that the heat output from the incandescent light bulbs, serves to mitigate heat input requirement, from the central heating system.

Arfa

"Arfa Daily"

** Or in Australia.

Householders do not turn their air con on because lamps are heating the house up!!

Fraid the sun is the culprit in that crime.

Commercial buildings that have large amounts of lighting and air con ALL use high efficiency lighting and have for decades.

The ONLY reason for banning incandescents is rabid green lunatics wanting to stamp their tiny feet and make a point, forcing others to carry out their mad ideas.

Same goes for effectively banning the use of iron core transformers in AC adaptors.

In both cases, the lunatics legislated energy efficiency levels ( plus off load consumptions ) such as to JUST eliminate the offending products and allow ones a tiny bit more efficient to continue on sale.

No consideration was given to far more important issues that were involved in the banning of such long proven and inherently safe products.

Purest lunacy.

.... Phil

**Indeed. I just did a little research and found that some of these issues HAVE been examined. The total manufacturing energy input for a typical CFL is around 1.7kWhr. The total manufacturing energy input for a typical incandescent is around 0.3kWhr. Considerably less. Or is it?

Let's put that into some kind of perspective:

A typical 100 Watt IC lasts for 1,000 hours (at best). A typical 15 Watt CFL lasts for 5,000 hours (I've certainly exceeding that figure quite comfortably).

Over 5,000 hours of use, the CFL has consumed 75kWhr + 1.7kWhr = 76.7kWhr. IOW: The energy cost of manufacture is almost insignificant, even though is a little higher than 5 incandescents.

Over 5,000 hours, the IC lamp has consumed 500kWhr + 1.5kWhr = 501.5kWhr.

I would argue that the energy cost of manufacture is a spurious argument.

The pollution cost is another matter entirely. During operation, coal fired generators (like those here in Australia) emit mercury. A typical 100 Watt lamp will cause the emission of around 10mg of mercury over it's life. 5 lamps (5,000 hours) will cause the release of 50mg or mercury. By comparison, CFLs will cause the release of around 7.5mg of mercury + 4mg of mercury contained within the envelope. If the lamp is disposed of correctly, then the total mercury release will be 7.5mg. Far less than that of IC lamps. Other nations, that employ different power generation schemes will see different results.

And this does not take into pollution created at the point of manufacture. That is an issue that should be dealt with locally.

**It's not a mistaken belief. It's a fact. CFLs use FAR less energy than incandescents. From cradle to grave. Vastly, hugely less energy.

If it's really the case, then CFLs will win out the day

**By a massive margin, in fact.

But I think that it is utterly wrong that the existing

**Your opinion is duly noted. That comment is a political issue. I recall EXACTLY the same arguments were made, here in Australia, when leaded petrol was legislated out of existence. I susepct that, in 20 years, when we look back at this whole discussion, it will appear to be a non-event. More efficient lighting will be the standard, incandescents will be relegated to specialised applications (oven lighting, etc) and the whole issue will be viewed for what it really is - a storm in a teacup. **So? Northern Europe is not the whole world. Vast swathes of this planet consume vast amounts of energy for air conditioning. Northern Europe is a small player in that respect. Worse, CO2 emissions from Northern Europe impact on those regions where a small amount of warming will lead to serious problems. We only have one place that we can all live. We all need to work together.

And, just to reinforce the point: I do not consider lighting to be a major problem in power consumption (and, therefore, CO2 emissions). Nor do I consider appliances that use auxiliary power to be a major issue either.

"Trevor Wilson"

** Translation = a fictitious pack of lies. ** Might also last 25 years in a low use app. ** No way is the light from a 15W CFL the same as a 100W lamp.

Try a 27 watt CFL.

** In average domestic us, the life is more lie 2000 hrs at best before the output falls too much and it has to be replaced.

the CFL has consumed 75kWhr + 1.7kWhr = 76.7kWhr.

** CFL = 54 kWh, 100W lamp = 200 kWh.

** A made up number.

The real number is more like 50 times.

** Bollocks.

Reducing domestic lighting consumption has NO effect on the amount of coal being burned in power stations.

Cos the domestic lighting load is all at night time when the coal powered generators have excess capacity - in NSW much of that excess is sent to the Snowy to pump water up hill to help with peaks loads during the day. In that process up to 60% of the power generated is lost in transmission lines and pumping.

.... Phil

The thing is, there are so many components to a CFL, and so many processes to make those components, and so many processes to extracting, refining and making appropriate the constituents *of* those components, that I think it is probably an impossible task to analyse the total energy budget of making one of these things, with any accuracy. There will probably also be a degree of deliberate distortion downwards to those figures by the greenies that would produce them, to make them look better. On the other hand, an incandescent bulb uses - what - seven, eight maybe components, each of which could be totally accurately pinned down on their production energy costs. Bear in mind that the processes to produce the components are also very simple and straightforward, unlike the processes required to make the components of a CFL.

I have to say that in my experience, you have been extremely lucky to get that sort of life from CFLs. I have used all sorts over the years, from cheap to expensive, and have never obtained anything like that length of service from any of them, with the exception of some very early ones that I installed in a day nursery that we once owned. They were Dulux globe CFLs and very expensive. We owned that nursery for twelve years, and most of them were still going when we sold it, so I don't dispute that it is possible to make long-lasting CFLs. I just don't think that overall, taken across the whole raft of qualities and costs, they are doing it any more. However, I have a lot of low voltage halogen downlighters in my house, that I put in more than ten years ago. Of the eight located above the stairwell, and the further five along the upstairs corridor, only one has failed in all that time, and that was only a few months ago. Maybe, like you with your CFLs, I have been lucky with these halogens. Here in the UK, there have been governmental drives to push CFLs, by heavily subsidising the cost of them, and in some cases, almost giving them away in supermarkets, and in others

*actually* giving them away. With the best will in the world, these are cheap crap, so that is what the general public are having foisted on them as a result of the drive to try to get people to actually want them, and is probably why the general experience is that they don't last anything like as long as the figures that they would try to have us believe. Also, those figures are only good - if at all- when the ballast is properly cooled, which means having the lamp in service the 'right' way up. Unfortunately, many lamp fixtures that they go in, don't do this, and luminaires enclose them completely. Incandescents didn't care about this, of course.

Only possibly, if you feel you are able to trust the figures for manufacturing energy budget. As I have said, I do not because of the complexity of arriving at a figure. Plus you also need to factor in the full energy cost of recycling the toxins contained within it at the end of its service life. There is zero cost for this with an incandescent, as it does not contain anything potentially harmful to the environment.

Again, these figures are only meaningful if you genuinely achieve a figure of 5000 hours across the board. And that is the important thing. *All* CFLs need to achieve that figure for the calculations to be valid, and that ain't never gonna happen, as long as there are cheapo Chinese ones flooding the market. In any case, in Europe, coal fired power stations have been on the decline for many years. Most are now gas or nuclear

On the face of it, they appear to, and as I said before, that is the *only* angle that's been exploited by the greenies, to try to gain them widespread acceptance. Personally, I believe that the situation is far less clear than this rather simplistic assumption, when you factor in the *true* costs. Almost certainly, they use less energy if you accept the simple picture, get the projected life from them, and believe the equivalence figures for light output, that they put on the boxes. And again, on this score, I understand that they are now trying to legislate over here, to mark the boxes in lumens or some such, probably because users are starting to doubt the quoted equivalence figures. In reality, if you have a genuine like for like in terms of light output, factor in the *real* costs of producing, transporting, and disposing of properly at the end, and get the more typical average service life of 2000 hours from them, then the saving becomes much less significant, and for me, insufficient reason to ban me from using incandescents.

Distorted by the fact that CFLs are effectively government sponsored, and that I cannot buy the bulbs I want any more, because they have banned them to make sure that I can't. If it was still incandescents vs CFLs on a level playing field, the take up of CFLs would be much less, which was the reason in the first place that they found it necessary to legislate to force people to use them.

I fail to see how you equate leaded petrol to the situation with CFLs. It is a different issue entirely, with very clear motives and outcomes. You would have to be brain dead not to understand that putting huge quantities of lead into the atmosphere at ground level and in a form that people could breathe, is bad in every way. Removing lead from petrol had little if any impact on the general public, because it was already possible to build engines that had no requirement for lead in their fuel, without compromising performance. It was, unlike CFLs, a classic example of a genuine *replacement* technology, which suffered no disadvantages over the technology that it was replacing. There was not even any need to challenge this bit of legislation, because the advantages were very clear to see in large cities the world over. Even if you clung on to your car that needed leaded petrol, this was still available at the pumps for some years after unleaded came in, and after it was finally removed from sale, there was still LRP (lead replacement petrol) available for some long time after that. Finally, if you still wanted to run your vintage engine, this could be achieved in most cases by the simple expedient of altering the ignition timing, and in the worst case, reducing the compression ratio a little, by fitting a thicker head gasket. CFLs are nothing like this. They are a substitute technology which is unable to replace incandescents in a number of areas - such as decorative light fittings - and having many other shortcomings in comparison to incandescents, in exchange for the dubious possibility that they in some way help to save the planet.

I'm having a bit of trouble picking the bones out of that one, Trevor. You made a very clear statement that a disadvantage of incandescents was that they generated heat that needed the use of aircon plant to remove. I merely stated that this is not the case in Northern Europe, where aircon is not common in the first place, and where the exact opposite of what you contend, is true. In the case of what you are stating, we are talking a double whammy in that the lights waste energy in producing heat, and then your energy-thirsty aircon plant has to be used to waste a bit more removing that heat. Here, the heat is not 'wasted' for much of the year, as it partially mitigates the required heating input from the central heating. 50 watts of heat pouring off a lightbulb into my living room, is 50 watts that my heating system has not got to put into my radiators. I fail to see what your point is regarding Northern Europe against 'vast swathes of the planet etc'. The population density of Northern Europe is much higher overall than that of many of these vast swathes that you refer to, so the fact that we don't use huge amounts of energy for aircon, equates to a much lower energy requirement per person, taken overall.

So why do you support the banning of a proven simple technology, which did the job of providing even-intensity pleasing-quality light, to everyone's satisfaction ??

Arfa

True. Dumping 4 tons of mercury into landfills every year is not a good thing. However, to put that in perspective, the coal that we use to generate most of our electricity has an estimated 75 tons of mercury mixed in, each year, two thirds of which is belched into the atmosphere. If you include the mercury emissions from generating the power needed to run an incandescent lamp, the CFL lamp dumps 1/4th the mercury into the environment as the incandescent.

Permit me to point out that US domestic and commerical electricity consumption has been increasing quite constantly at the rate of about

1.5%/year. If there were any energy savings from the existing CFL lamps in service, it would have appeared as a drop in the consumption trend. It's a bit tricky to use, but you can dig the history and trends out of:

Tungsten, as used in incandescent lamps, may not be all that environmentally correct:

There's not much known about the effects of tungsten in the environment, but it is becoming yet another thing to worry about.

I wouldn't worry much about phosphorus as we're scheduled to run out in 50-100 years.

But as I said, coal fired plants have been declining over the years in Europe - for instance, we operate just 14 here in the UK now. France has none, I believe. Apparently, the vast majority of increase in CO2 emissions, and use of coal to fire power plants, is coming from India and China. These are both technologically competent nations, who are ignoring any responsibility they might have to reduce emissions. So why does that mean that I have to suffer a 'pissing into the wind' replacement for technology that I am happy with, so they can carry on regardless ?

Arfa

**I believe that may well be an over-statement. At some point, we have to be able to place some trust in those who do their investigations into such things. Anyway, let's assume that the investigators have made an error amounting to 100%. Even with such an error, CFLs leave ICs in their dust. Let's assume that the investigators are completely inept and they have made an error amounting to 1,000%. Even with an energy input figure of 17kW, CFLs leave ICs for dead.

There will probably also be a degree of deliberate

**You're making the assumption that those who have investigated the matter, have an axe to grind either way. Bad assumption. If you can supply your alternate data, please feel free to do so. Here is my reference:

On the other hand, an

**Your point being?

It's not impossible to pin down the cost of manufacturing the relatively small number of components in a CFL. Car manufacturers routinely do just that, for what is a dramatically more complex device.

**Luck has nothing to do with it. I only buy quality CFLs and I have 19 of the suckers in service. If I had (say) 2 in service and not experienced a failure, then I might agree with you. I have NINETEEN of them in and around my home. And, FWIW: several of them are not installed according to manufacturer's instructions. They are surviving nicely.

I have used all sorts over the

**I confess that I have not purchased a CFL for several years, so I can't confirm. The damned things are so incredibly long lasting that I simply have not had to purchase replacements. In fact, I fully expect LEDs to be appropriately priced by the time I need to make any changes.

However, I have a

**Perhaps. I swapped out all my iron transformers for SMPS some years ago, to increase efficiency. The SMPS seem to deliver a pretty accurate Voltage, so I doubt that is an issue. As an aside, my mother has a number of 12 Volt halogens in her kitchen. I receive at least 2 calls per year to replace blown lamps. I believe that low Voltage halogen downlights are an utterly evil blight on society. They are OK for directing light into specific areas, but are hopeless at lighting a space, relatively inneficient and they don't last very long.

Here in the

**There are no subsidies in Australia for CFls, though the government did give the things away for a couple of years. I snagged a few, but found the colour temperature horrible and the lamps were clearly cheap rubbish. The Philips lamps I buy are regularly sold for around $5.00 each. That's for a 23 Watt lamp, that, IME, has a life of AT LEAST 3,500 hours (I expect at least double that figure) and, after 6 years of operation, is registering less than a 5% fall in light output. Whichever way you slice it, that is exceptional value for money.

With

**Perhaps. In my last home, I used a 150 Watt IC lamp and managed to do serious damage to the plaster ceiling in the process. The fitting survived fine, as it was designed to cope. The plaster was not. A CFL solved the problem. **Do the math with a figure of 17kWhr. The CFL is STILL ahead by a country kilometre.

As I have said, I do not because of the

**Not entirely true, but you point is well made. CFLs MUST be properly disposed of. Again, this is not an impossibly costly exercise. Thos whacky Swedes managed 75% recycling back in 2007.

Like all such things, the rates of recylcing will increase and the cost will decrease over time.

**Philips cite 6,000 hours for their lamps. Most manufacturers of IC lamps cite an average of 750 - 1,000 hours for their standard IC lamps. These can be made to last longer, but at the cost of efficiency. Fundamentally, however, I take issue with your constant reference to cheap, crappy lamps. I have CONSISTENTLY stated that I refer only to quality lamps (like Philips). It would be like you trying to argue that automobiles are fundamentally unsafe, unreliable and uneconomical, by using ONLY Tata automobiles as your reference. You should be using Toyota, Honda, Mecedes, Hyundai and the others as part of your reference.

No more talk of cheap, s***ty lamps please. Whilst they are are available and fools will buy them, they are not representative of state of the art in quality or longevity.

**Incorrect. ALL green groups have expressed reservations about the proper disposal of CFLs.

Personally, I believe that the situation

**Fair enough. Cite these "true" costs you speak of. Numbers please.

Almost certainly, they use less energy if

**My CFLs are averaging far more than 2,000 hours. Do you have any data to supplort your notion that QUALITY CFLs manage an average of 2,000 hours? Are you aware of any consumer legal action against Philips? After Philips cite a 6,000 hour life for their product. Here in Australia, the penalties are severe for companies engaged in misleading advertising of that nature. Recently, LG was penalised several hundred thousand Dollars for making misleading claims about the efficiency of their refrigerators. I'm certain the legislators would be happy to tackle Philips, if you can supply solid supporting evidence to back your claims (about QUALITY CFLs). **Not in Australia. They compete in the market, like any other product. They cost approximately 5 times as much as an equivalent IC lamp. They last 5 times longer and use 1/5th as much energy.

his might prove an intgeresting read for you:

**I agree with that. Most people are, fundamentally, greedy, self-serving, fools. They'll choose the cheapest, upfront solution, without regard to longevity or running costs. **As is feeding excessive CO2 into the atmosphere. Too much CO2 is causing excessive warming of this planet. **That was not the case here in Australia. Manufacturers had to alter their production systems, costing millions of Dollars to cope. Most automobiles suffered a performance fall when switched to unleaded fuel. Those who retained their leaded fuel autos have to use expensive additives to compensate. **Not here in Australia. Costs rose for buyers.

There was not even any need to challenge this bit

**Incorrect. Leaded fuel vehicles require an additive to allow correct operation of valves (seats). The simple expedient of altering timing is only for making up for differences in octane, not lead.

CFLs are nothing like this. They are a substitute technology

**Specialised IC lamps are still available in Australia. I don't know about Europe. Fancy lamps, oven lamps and others are still available. For those who refuse to change, halogen replacements are still available. **Apart from those places where geo-thermal energy is common, or temperatures are too low, heat pumps (aka: air conditioners) are a far more efficient method of heating a home than resistive heating. **Points:

• IC lamps are NOT to everyone's satisfaction. I have ONLY used fluoro lighting in my workshop for the last 40 years.

• IC lamps are unreliable and wasteful of energy.

But we're not talking cost here. We're talking energy budgets and planetary pollution from industrial processes. Any fool can say "this transistor costs us 20 cents. This capacitor costs us 5 cents" and so on. But it's an awful lot more complex to start looking into the energy budget for refining the silicon. For turning the silicon into P and N types. For refining the plastic from the oil. For getting the oil out of the ground. For getting the iron ore out of the ground. For refining the iron out of the ore, and then converting it to steel. Transporting all the constituents. Manufacturing them into a transistor. Then shipping that transistor to the CFL maker. And on and on. And that's just one component out of a considerable number - see

My point obviously being that in comparison, an incandescent has a very few constituent parts, all of which are simple, and have simple well defined manufacturing processes, that could easily be energy budgeted.

Well, good luck with that one. As long as they have to keep putting any kind of control electronics in them to make them run from AC line voltage, then as long as they are not subsidised, they are never going to get as cheap as incandescents, or have as low an energy budget to produce. Whilst there have been some major advances in recent years in the light output and efficiency of LEDs , they still have relatively poor colour rendition qualities for home use, and still struggle to produce even omni-directional light as is required for general lighting, due to the fact that the light is produced at a flat surface. As to not experiencing the same longevity as you with my CFLs, I thought that I carefully explained that I have purchased all qualities of the things, and have not found the expensive 'quality' names to be any longer lived than the cheapos. This seems to be the findings of others on here, as well.

Well no. That is an unfair slant in favour of the CFL argument. As long as cheap crappy ones are available, *most* people - not just "fools" as you so disparagingly refer to them - will buy them over the expensive quality ones, because they don't understand the difference, as we do. It's human nature to buy cheap, which is why the Chinese are doing so well on the back of world-wide sales of cheap - and often crap quality - electronic goods, offered for sale through all our nations' supermarkets. This is where the whole thing breaks down as an argument about the eco validity of any of this technology. The manufacturers of the cheap CFLs are in it purely to make money. They have no concern at all for the 'green' credentials of their products, except in as much as they will sell in their millions, irrespective of their quality, just because the *are* CFLs. So whilst it is true what you say in that the cheapo ones are not representative of the state of the art, unfortunately, they *are* representative of what is being sold in quantity to the general public, and their contribution to the validity of the discussion, cannot be ignored until *all* CFLs that are offered for sale, are indeed representative of the state of the art. I'm sorry if that offends your sensibilities, but it *is* part of the overall equation. In fact, your analogy with the cars, is self-defeating, because you could look at it from the other angle, and say that if you take say BMW as your reference, then all other cheaper makes are invalid because they are not 'state of the art', and people who buy them are fools. The cheaper makes will always be bought by the general public, because not everyone can afford the safety and performance of a BMW, just like not everyone can afford to pay £5 or whatever for a bulb to replace an incandescent that they are used to paying 50 pence for. If there is a CFL costing 50 pence on the shelf alongside the £5 one, you tell me, which one are most uninformed people going to buy ? And it is for precisely this reason that the whole CFL thing, taken on a world-wide basis, falls apart.

But that is actually another comparatively minor issue. Important from the pollution point of view, yes, but insignificant compared to the manufacturing energy budgets and pollution-causing manufacturing processes, that are NEVER mentioned by these groups, because they never even consider these 'hidden' aspects.

I cannot give numbers, because there are none that FULLY analyse ALL energy inputs and pollution outputs for the hundreds of processes involved. And when I say "costs", I am not talking monetary ones, as I explained earlier. As I said, I am sure that it is just too complicated a situation to ever be able to arrive at a real figure, but no matter how much you don't want to believe it, you have to accept that there *are* many hundreds of process steps and transport steps involved in CFL manufacture, compared to incandescent manufacture, which *must* add up to a very significant amount, that is being totally ignored in making the 'green' case for the things. Whether it can be accurately quantified or not, if you stop and think about it, it is common sense.

See my earlier comments regarding quality CFLs versus the reality of what people *actually* buy ...

I don't understand this. By saying that, you make my case for me, and utterly destroy your own ...

That is by no means proven in science. Only in the media. There are many reputable scientists who believe otherwise.

There is little difference between engines that burn leaded and unleaded fuel. For sure, there had to be some modification to the production and design processes, but these occur for the manufacturers every time they bring out a new model or engine. The monetary costs of doing this are factored into a new design, so will actually not have been any particularly burdensome problem for the manufacturers. Drops in performance of existing engines when converted to run on unleaded fuel were actually fairly minor, and most people here, at least, did not even bother converting because leaded petrol was available alongside unleaded, for a reasonable time period. Back when all this happened, cars were not that long-lived anyway, so unless you had only just bought a new one, it was no great shakes that the next one you bought would be produced with an unleaded petrol engine, already designed in. The manufacturers knew this was coming, and had plenty of time to carry out the required design alterations, and actually to amortise the costs in their existing production, in readiness for the legislation.

The lead was in the petrol as an anti-knock agent, as I recall

Nope. Pretty much all outlawed here. You can't get a proper golf ball or candle any more. You haven't been able to get pearlised bulbs of any description for a long time. Truly specialised ones for ovens etc are still available, because it is simply impossible to replace them with anything else. Halogen 'Apollo nose-cones' are still available at the moment, and capsule halogens still are, but only in clear envelopes, which are pretty useless compared to frosted ones. I was looking around the other day to see if I could still find any halogen replacements (the type where a halogen capsule bulb is incorporated into a 'traditional' shaped incandescent envelope), and the only ones of those that I could find were clear. These give a very harsh light, whereas the pearlised ones, gave a very nice even light

Arfa

On 25/09/2011 8:03 AM, Trevor Wilson wrote: [snipped an awful lot]

I think there is a place for halogen spot lights. In my kitchen area, with a pine-lined cathedral ceiling, I have 4 halogens. They are well placed above the critical spots where I need good lighting.

The 35W lamps from Ikea are just as bright as the old 50W. (Even the 20W ones could be an option now).

I run them on electronic ballasts and on a trailing edge dimmer, for a soft background light when the kitchen's closed:) The dimmer has a soft start switch, very nice! I have had no 35W lamps failing after 3 years which equates to an estimated 2000 hrs on full power, and the dimming hasn't done any harm to them.

I have, for now, substituted 2 of the halogens with LED lights from Deal Extreme (MR16 4-LED 360-Lumen 3500K Warm White Light Bulb (12V) Item Number 39027 49.5mm, $8.30) which consume only 6W (6W instead of 35 is a strong argument). They are bright enough but the yellowish colour really needs to get used to. I don't know if I will keep them or get some more white ones instead. Maybe someone has tried some more and different ones? Let us know what you think. There is just too many too chose from.

Tony

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