Ray

Gun Grape,

Thanks.

In my country the instructions are ever so limited!

That is why foreign goods, though expensive, are always preferred. This has sort of kicked our domestic industry (even though they are subsidiaries of foreign companies) into action.


Whatever, a great thread.

Learnt a lot!

__________________


"Some have learnt many Tricks of sly Evasion, Instead of Truth they use Equivocation, And eke it out with mental Reservation, Which is to good Men an Abomination."

I don't have to attend every argument I'm invited to.

HAKUNA MATATA

gunnut

I find this board to be a never ending fountain of valuable information.

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"Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

Ray

My sentiments precisely!

reasonmclucus

The last I heard fluorescent tubes were supposed to be banned from landfills -- that is if the EPA ever develops regulations for disposing of them.

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There must be no barriers for freedom of inquiry. R. Oppenheimer

Ctom3

There are specific lamp types that only make sense to outlaw, such as T12 fluorescents and mercury vapor. This is because there are direct replacements that are far more energy efficient that also have only a small cost premium, if any. However, incandescent does not fit that category very well. There are many applications where incandescent lamps are still the preferred choice because nothing else comes close to doing the job.

That does not mean that they cannot be legislated so that they are used in a sensible manner. It is now pretty common that state and local building ordinances have increasingly more strict energy conservation requirements that state maximum wattage densities (watts per square foot) for new construction. The requirements are becoming too stringent to allow very much use of incandescent and can best be met by using highly efficient fluorescent sources combined with high frequency, electronic ballasts in high performance reflector/lens systems. This does not address all of those buildings that currently contain older inefficient lighting, but local and state level incentive programs can produce similar results for them.

Using this method to discourage the use of incandescents has at least three advantages over direct regulation. It accomplishes the basic goal of reducing energy consumption in an aggressive, predictable and measurable fashion. Second, it allows the limited use of incandescent lamps where nothing else will do the job as well. Lastly, manufacturers of all lamp types and fixture manufacturers are motivated to improve the performance of their products as a matter of market pressure. The guy that can provide a luminaire that saves 1/2 watt per square foot over his competition is going to dominate the market until they catch up.

skier842

5 milligrams per bulb. If all 4 billion bulbs in the US were to be disposed of and replaced, there would be 50,000 pounds of mercury.

CFL's should be recycled along with a lot of other items that fill up out land fills. We can save our natural resources now and convert to LEDs when they become more affordable. Many cities are already converting street and traffic signals to LEDs.

dalem

My concern is less about the actual danger and more about the inevitable cycle of restriction, price control, and litigation.

Eventually the government is going to force me to buy mercury bulbs, and then force me to dispose of them in a particular way and attempt to punish me if I don't.

Screw that.

-dale