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According to the Department of Energy (DOE), lighting uses nearly 40% of all electricity used in commercial buildings. The standards announced today affect the more than 500 million fluorescent tube lamps and 265 million reflector lamps sold each year in the United States. About 7% of all energy consumed in the United States is for lighting.
According to DOE, the new standards announced today will save up to 1.2 trillion kilowatt-hours over thirty years, an amount about equal to the total consumption of all homes in the U.S. in one year. Businesses and consumers will gain up to $35 billion in net savings and global warming carbon dioxide emissions will be cut by up to 594 million metric tons, an amount equal to the annual emissions of nearly 110 million cars.
For the past several years the City of Milwaukee has actively tried to reduce energy use in City Hall and other city facilities. Since 2005 or so the Department of Public Works has been installing LED traffic signals throughout the City of Milwaukee. An LED (light emitting diode) traffic light provides as much or more light as a conventional bulb using a quarter of the energy, while lasting much longer. Mayor Barrett was quoted in today's Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that street lighting aacounts for well over 50% of the energy used by the city. According to Ann Beier, Director of Environmental Sustainability, the city has been replacing incandescent bulbs with fluorescent lamps and replacing older, less efficient fluorescent lamps with smaller, more efficient bulbs.
With the change of standards it should get easier for the average consumer to make the shift to more efficient light bulbs. No more standing in the store aisle and reading labels to make sure the bulb in your hand is “energy smart”.
Comments
Americans choose to buy ordinary light bulbs around 9 times out of 10.
Banning what Americans want gives the supposed savings - no point in banning an impopular product!
If new LED lights -or improved incandescents- are good,
people will buy them - no need to ban ordinary light bulbs (little point).
If they are not good, people will not buy them - no need to ban ordinary light bulbs (no point).
Since when does America need to save on electricity?
There is no energy shortage, there are plenty of local energy sources, Middle East oil is not used for electricity generation.
Certainly it is good to let people know how they can save energy and money - but why force them to do it?
Does your light bulb give out any gases?
Low emission households will increase everywhere, since emissions will be reduced anyway through the planned use of coal/gas processing technology or energy substitution
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For a referenced list against light bulb bans see
ceolas.net/#lx onwards
I am thinking it is good to not be wasteful in any thing that we consume, lights, water, food, chocolate... the problem that I am becoming aware of is fear. Fear of using too much energy for a lightbulb! Wow. What the fear should be is the "hazmat" team that is needed for one of these new bulbs if it breaks. How many janitors, housekeepers and any homeowner know how to clean up a broken bulb? Does anyone know that it is a hazard area? Mercury poisoning? I don't think so. Maybe the "Examiner" should examine the ill affects of these "wonderful" energy saving, life killing bulbs.
Just a thought.
I can understand if Ms Daly is confused, as the new energy standards are about as clear as LA smog in 1975.
But I'd be extremely surprised if they mandated replacing linear tubes with CFLs, as he best linear tubes are much more effective than CFLs, due to their size. Rather, it's a question of replacing poor-performing tubes with more effective tubes, and poor performing bulbs with more effective bulbs.
There is also a difference between traffic lights and street lights. Traffic lights = traffic signals. Street lights are what light up streets and roads. Replacing the incandescent bulbs in traffic signals with LEDs is a great idea. But this will of course only cut the traffic light part of the street light energy bill.
To save on street lighting, you need to replace the existing mercury or sodium lights with ceramic metal halide in Cobra luminaires with HF-ballasts. This can save 50-70% (they look better too, and have better colour renering) but switching costs.
I agree that changing lights for street lighting will go a long way toward saving some money for the city budget and get a more pleasant light. It would be good to find out the cost benefit analysis for the switch.
As to the issue of getting beyond the incandescent light bulb - the time is now. It is an inferior technology as the common bulb produces more heat than light and highly inefficient.
The benefit from the federal mandate is that more manufacturers will begin to offer more choice, specifically in the LED category. That is good for all of us.
The reason to cut our demand for electricity is that about 24% of our energy use comes from coal and the bulk of it is used for electricity. Coal is a lead source of fuel for the generation of electricity worldwide and consequently the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions. Gross carbon dioxide emission from coal usage is slightly more than that from petroleum and about double the amount from natural gas.
There is also a difference between traffic lights and street lights. Traffic lights = traffic signals. Street lights are what light up streets and roads. Replacing the incandescent bulbs in traffic signals with LEDs is a great idea.
regards,
Kadisha
darcylars@googlemail.com
www.lyco.co.uk/
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