Arguments about CFLs vs: incandescent bulbs

Paul suggested I post this on the forum. A childhood friend of mine posted the following on FaceBook:

Congress overturns incandescent light bulb ban

His comment about the article: Curse the GOP planet-destroyers and their dirty-energy blackmail tactics. Guarantee this will result in numerous coal power plants running for decades longer than necessary. Which means we are even more screwed for sea-level rises, droughts and floods than we already have been.

I posted Paul's article about CFL's on RichsSoil.com and my friend responded with:

Two things, Charles. 1) Clearly the CFLs are a stopgap measure. 2) The amount of mercury emitted just to produce the power differential for an incandescent with the standard grid mix is greater than that contained in the CFL. The only way the analysis would work is if the electricity were not produced from coal, or if the mercury were scrubbed out of the coal-plant exhaust. And if CFLs are handled properly, NO mercury is released into the environment. Incandescents release copious amounts of mercury just by existing. Fluorescent lighting has saved untold electricity since its invention in the early 20th century. CFLs will be phased out soon, but they have their place.

And of course, Charles, the article is full of other propaganda and paranoia you should really think twice about posting. Not only wrong, but wildly so. For instance, he talks about CFL subsidy, but says nothing about fossil fuel subsidies or externalities. I think you should improve the sourcing of your articles generally.

here's something about being a contrarian which makes people lose their critical thinking skills. If you're going against consensus, better have your ducks in a row.

I am here to "get my ducks in a row" before responding to him. Thoughts on what I should say in response, or is my friend correct?

But clearly in the Northern climes you will have to burn something to keep your house warm for half the year. Where I live almost no electricity is from coal. So in Winter it is more environmentally friendly to use incandescent since the heating factor is neutral. I actually switch some rooms from CFL to incandescent around November.

He is 'vested' and would loose face if he truly looked at other perspectives. Everything he says about what you presented can be said of what he is presenting.

He says "Curse the GOP planet-destroyers and their dirty-energy blackmail tactics" but makes no mention of the loss of freedom of choice, nor of government over stepping it's role. A dangerous slippery slope indeed. He is one of those that believes the will of the few should override the choice of the many. Everyone that doesn't believe as he does is wrong and unfit to govern themselves. So call in the government and new laws to control the stupid bastards and make their choices for them.

People can believe whichever side in keeping with their values and beliefs, those who are passionate can present their side in the public forum, but....
Curse the controlling destroyers of freedom, curse those who through propaganda and fear take away my right to choose for myself through bigger government and restrictive laws.

I made up my own mind as soon as the truth came out, long before Paul's article. Mercury is not for me or my house - ever! That's my choice, it should be my right.

IMO this is not a CFL question it is a question of freedom, and I want mine.... so I can vote with my money and a free market can respond with better choices and products.

Im agree with Nemo and really like your solution of switching to incandescent in the Winter to help with the Heating load. Something people need to be careful about: If your lighting outlet box is not fully air sealed (recessed cans especially vulnerable) then the driving force of an incandescent can suck quite a bit of conditioned air into the attic. This is huge energy penalty on top of Incandescent's terrible lighting efficiency.

People arguing against CFLs are wasting their time. LEDs are taking over. They arent perfect yet but address the biggest problem of Incandescents; terrible Lumens per Watt. http://www.buildinggreen.com/auth/article.cfm/2011/11/29/LEDs-The-Future-Is-Here/

Charles Kelm wrote:Clearly the CFLs are a stopgap measure.

Lighting accounts for 10% of household electricity use, household electricity use accounts for 39% of total electricity use, electricity uses 40% of total energy, and 70% of electricity is derived from fossil fuels.

Household Lighting:
10% of household electricity use
3.9% of total electricity use
1.1% of total fossil fuel use

For fresh CFLs and using manufacturers inflated lumen numbers would translate into a savings of 7.5% off of household electricity use and 0.8% off of total fossil fuel use. Using more realistic numbers (65% of claimed lumen, 80% lumens over it's lifetime) gives us 3.9% household electricity savings and 0.42% total fossil fuel savings.

3.9% isn't a stopgap, it's a joke, it's nothing, almost anything you do to conserve power will dwarf these pitiful savings.

The amount of mercury emitted just to produce the power differential for an incandescent with the standard grid mix is greater than that contained in the CFL.

As Wheaton states in his article this is only true if we accept very generous estimations of CFL light output and longevity, and landfill mercury sequestration.

And if CFLs are handled properly, NO mercury is released into the environment.

It's ludicrous to believe that the average consumer will be disposing of them properly when eco-conscious early adopters aren't.

There's also the every present risk to the occupants of a broken CFL.

Who, amongst us, has never broken a light bulb?

John Polk wrote:Who, amongst us, has never broken a light bulb?

Exactly.... and what about children and their accidents.
Something always gets broken by flying objects when raising children.

It's crazy to think I'd buy a common household product I have to be afraid of.

Incandescent light bulbs were supposed to become illegal in Canada today but the government has finally caught up to the mercury question so now is dithering. They aren't backpedalling very far; they are now giving the manufacturers of CFL bulbs until 2014 to figure out ways to arrange for "proper disposal" whatever that means.

Lots of people don't recycle anything as it is..I wonder how many kids will have to get mercury poisoning from stepping on a broken bulb or breathing in the vapours before the government wakes up and realizes we really could do better than deliberately putting such stuff into the environment at all. However, lots of people didn't know anything about the dangers of cfls so there may be a backlash which gets rid of them entirely.

RE Permaculture Dec 2011 Podcast
http://www.richsoil.com/permaculture/623-podcast-100-cfl-compact-fluorescent-lightbulbs/

See http://sendyourlightbulbstowashington.wordpress.com/
Linking to it
It also links to your site on right hand side.

The CFL issue is also extensively covered on the Ceolas.net site
eg
http://www.ceolas.net/#li15eux

The WATimes was, to be generous, exaggerating; The law was restricted to low-efficiency bulbs. And most manufacturers had already made changes to incandescent bulbs increasing their efficiency to legally acceptable levels. Which probably says more about how low the requirements were than anything else.

For most of the other claims, it would really give more credence to your argument to actually bring some supporting evidence to the table.

"Approved during the George W. Bush administration, EISA (Energy Independence and Security Act ) established light bulb standards requiring manufacturers to develop 27 percent more efficient incandescent bulbs by 2014." http://www.nytimes.com/cwire/2011/07/13/13climatewire-market-for-more-efficient-light-bulbs-moves-12837.html

"Section 321 sets an energy efficiency standard for general service incandescent
lamp" http://energy.senate.gov/public/_files/RL342941.pdf

To clarify RE the Washington Times article in the above post

The 2012 sale of regular 100W incandescents was never banned
Only the manufacture and import.
Since stores are stocking up, it will not change things for consumers short term.
However, it does mean Congressmen are forced to look again at the whole issue
in election year 2012.

Also, long term is a different story:
incandescent technology for ordinary lamps will effectively come to be banned,
on the mandated 45 lumen per Watt end regulation standard
(touted halogen incandescent replacements only reach typically 20-22 lumens per W)
See
http://freedomlightbulb.blogspot.com/2011/12/after-funding-amendment-clear_18.html

RE Madison Wells comment that energy savings are insignificant overall

this is true:
See the Energy Dept etc referenced rundown http://ceolas.net/#li171x
= less than 1% of total energy, 1-2% grid electricity saved
Much more relevant generation, grid upgrade, alternative consumption savings, as described

Also.. more on the deception behind the regulations
http://freedomlightbulb.blogspot.com/2011/11/deception-behind-ban.html

something for Charles to chew over

RE CFL Mercury and Coal mercury

Clearly Charles's friend doesn't know what EPA is doing.

The coal plant "rat in a pizza" argument keeps doing the rounds,
but USA EPA administration themselves are not pursuing that
argument (whatever about old diagrams floating around), following the
90% mercury emission reduction mandate as pursued under new EPA head Lisa Jackson.

Ban proponents use old mercury emission data
- just like they use old CO2 emissions data,
project that forward to 2030,
and then talk of multi-million ton savings
- completely ignoring planned output reduction changes

It never was true anyway, for the extensive referenced reasons here:
http://ceolas.net/#li198x
(Of course, to the user, a broken bulb in the home is a likely greater
worry than a distant chimney emission release anyway, again with
reference to EPA in their thorough clean-up mandates)

One argument that I have never even heard mentioned comes to mind:

By their shape, CFLs would be useless for darning socks. The incandescent is the clear winner here.

Your friend is right, there is a lot of propaganda. from the CFL industry channeled through all sorts of wacky places.

How could there be propaganda from the incandescent industry? Those are the guys that will get rich switching everybody to CFLs.

the article is full of other propaganda and paranoia you should really think twice about posting. Not only wrong, but wildly so. For instance, he talks about CFL subsidy, but says nothing about fossil fuel subsidies or externalities.

So let me see if I understand this logic. There cannot be a CFL subsidy because there is no mention of other subsidies.

Charles, I think I've learned that your quality standards for friends is set really low. You need to be more picky.

In the meantime, I think your friend makes a perfect example of the kind of fountains of misinformation that are the norm today.

Well, I haven't seen him in like 22 years. It's funny you mention that Neil, because he very often de-freinds anybody who isn't inline with his Obama-can-do-no-wrong idealogy. I'm only still his friend because I try not to be too antagonistic.

Paul, yeah, my friend is pretty smart - he'll be the first to tell you so.

Paul and Jocelyn talk about some friends of theirs that recently had an energy audit on their house. They talk about CFL lighting, and the importance of making lifestyle changes in sustainability. podcast