A poll about light bulbs

[Pagan Wizard]

I want to ask everyones opinion here about this subject. Please voice your choice, and if you will, explain your choice.

Which of these light bulbs is the lesser of two evils.

Bulb "A" which uses a lot of electricity and doesn't last very long.

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/Boomer7049/bulb2.jpg

Bulb "B" which uses a lot LESS electricity and if improperly disposed of (which most are) introduces toxic mercury into the environment.

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/Boomer7049/bulb1.jpg

[Pagan Wizard]

I vote for bulb "A" as being the lesser of two evils. I say this because I would rather pay for a little more electricity , than poison the environment. Some states have recycling centers for these and other flourescent bulbs, such as California for example. A friend of mine moved there a few years ago and has told me that bulb "A" will soon no longer be available for sale in California. Residents are also going to be required by law to recycle bulb "B", and all other flourecsents, at designated recycle centers. The problem with this is that the closest recycle center to his home is 75 miles one way, or 150 miles for the round trip. When he gets to the recycle center, he gets to pay $1.00 for every bulb he is turning in for recycle. I don't think the wasted gas in making the round trip justifies not being able to spend a few extra dollars lighting your home.

[SirJoey]

You make good points both ways, Wiz. In your particular case, it sounds like bulb "A" is a no-brainer. 75 miles to the recycle center would be insane. Doesn't seem fair to charge a buck apiece to recycle the CFLs, either. Sure doesn't encourage people to recycle them.

I agree with your not wanting to further contaminate the environment. For me though, I'm using the CFLs. Our power rate is high here, & I'm retired & on a very tight budget, so for me, the CFL is the logical choice. Additionally, there's talk of tripling or even quadrupling our power rate, in which case it will take every penny I can possibly spare, just to pay the power bill, even though I'm ULTRA conservative! Sadly, if that happens, my newfound bike hobby will go straight down the drain!

Our recycle center is about 7 miles from here & I have to make the trip every couple of weeks anyway, since we have no trash collection in the rural area where I live. Unfortunately, so far, they have no provision for the CFLs yet, but I'm hoping they soon will.

[Doc Hollywood]

I would choose "B" to save money on electricity. As for the recycling end you could just throw them all in a box until you were making a trip and just drop them off at the recycling center after hours and leave them on the door step with a polite note saying that you drove 75 miles to deliver them and by the time you got there the place was closed and you weren't going to drive home and back again.

They would have to dispose of them and you wouldn't have to pay.:rolleyes:

[Pagan Wizard]

The 75 mile reference was about a friend of mine who lives in California, not me. In my case, in Illinois, there are no recycle centers that accept flourescent bulbs. I have seen big businesses forced into throwing dozens (at a time) of the long flourescent tubes in the trash. The point I am trying to make here is that "everyone" wants to save the environment, but nobody really wants to do anything about creating ways to do so. They come up with a way to save here, but it ends up costing more somewhere else. Storing flourescents in a box in your home or garage is a good idea untill you can make it to a recycle center, provided you have access to one. But what do you do when that box falls or something gets dropped onto it and a few bulbs break exposing your immediate living environment to become contaminated by mercury?? The residents of California are getting tea-bagged by the state which is in bed with the companies that make these bulbs. The state is getting huge kick-backs for passing legislation that banned the sale of regular bulbs. And now, just to force feed these bulbs into every home in the state, they are threatening to raise electric rates. It boils down to a win/win situation for the state, and a lose/lose situation for the consumers. Win/win for the state.....kick-backs from flourescent bulb manufacturers, charging the citizens $$ to recycle burned out bulbs, and raising electric rates. Lose/lose for the consumer......spend more for the flourescent bulbs, spend $$ to recycle dead bulbs, and if they break, you contaminate possibly your own home with mercury. Doesn't really sound like the consumers are saving anything.......including money or the environment.

[n9viw]

PW, your argument is theoretically sound, but illogical. By not including all the facts, you're presenting a one-sided argument.

Which would you prefer: Bulb A, which uses 75 times the electricity, being provided by your local power plant, which is either fueled by coal or nuclear power, both of which belch emissions in the form of offgassing, steam, and resultant solid waste (you want to talk about toxic, have you SEEN the barges of spent uranium and plutonium fuel rods in docked storage up and down the Mississippi?! Also, coal is not "clean burning", as they claim... chemically treated and "washed" coal creates a solid ash that is more toxic than burning down every living tree in the USA), as well as containing Halogen and other toxic Noble gases...

... or Bulb B, which, while containing Mercury, uses a fraction of the power of Bulb A, uses LESS glass, LESS gas, AND is recyclable (UNLIKE Bulb A!)?

My whole house has Bulb B in it, except for the bathroom, because the motion-sensor switch can't run them. The new CFLs are almost indistinguishable from incandescent light... I was able to convert the house, room by room, until all of them were switched over. It took my wife several weeks to figure it out, and then only because the bulbs are slightly dim when they first power up. At first, she thought it was her eyes, until I let her in on the secret!
Our power bill has been slashed in half, and we'll never go back to Bulb A. I consider a yearly trip to the local recycling center a small price to pay in return. So far, we've only had ONE CFL go out, and I think that's because I dropped it first. They last longer than the longest-lasting incandescent bulb, longer than fluorescent tube, and use a miniscule portion of halogen filament bulbs (which are too bright and hot to use on a daily basis, anyway). To my mind, if you MUST use electric light, they are the ONLY option.

[AtomicZombie]

I find bulb-A to be better when it comes to needing a brighter light. We use bulb-B in most room lights to save power. I also like taking the guts out of bulb-B when they die, as the inverter circuit has some good stuff inside.

Brad

[KoolKat]

I prefer Bulb B, and we switched most of our bulbs, except the outdoor lights. As n9viw, motion sensors don't work with Bulb B and we had one explode on an outdoor light this past winter. The recycling thing bothers me, though. We have no recycling facility here to bring our bulbs. Seems stupid we're supposed to save electricity costs, yet the discarded bulbs end up in the landfill, contaminating soil. Someone didn't think this through. I do find that Bulb A are much brighter, though, and we need more lamps in our livingroom, so are we really saving $ at all?

[n9viw]

I don't find the CFLs any less bright than the incandescents, but we only run 40 and 60W incandescents, anyway. The 23 and 46W CFLs do just fine in those applications, and we learn to do with less light anyway, wind up turning lights OFF rather than turning more ON. Maybe it's just us. ;)

[KoolKat]

Yeah, we like 100W for reading, but I'm getting used to the 46W CFLs. Just renovated the livingroom, so had to buy new lamps, which make our lives even that much brighter!

[TheKid]

We use the kitchen light the most, but the lights are on a ceiling fan. The CFL's don't last long at all during the time of year we use the fan. The outdoor lights are all CFL's. One has a built in darkness sensor and goes on automatically at dusk. That was the last one I installed, in 1993. The other two were installed in 1990. I have not changed the bulbs since installing them. There's talk of banning bulb A here in Nassau County, and if they charge us to recycle Bulb B, there will be a revolution. Charging a fee to recycle anything is ridiculous. The taxes are too high as it is, and a fee of this sort is just another tax.

[dharouff]

I'm just wondering how many of us were given a drop of Mercury to play with in science class?

The 6 most left on bulbs are CFL and it has cut my bill, 3 in the kitchen, 1 in the living room and 2 that always seem to be left on in the laundry room.

FULL DISCLOSURE I work for a electric utility.

Of all the studies (100's) only one found a problem with 12 Eskimos over a 15 years time. And those were related to diet. The utilities could buy Jamaica and relocate the Eskimos or provide them Omaha Steaks nearly forever.

There are about 1100 operating plants in the US at a cost of about $250 million each to add Mercury suppression systems to take it out of the air and put it ???? So electricity is going to go up.

I guess maybe they could continue to use some of the Mercury to stabilize vaccines, anybody get a flu shot?

Oooops, think I'll go out in the shop and burn this soapbox. ..... then there is the science fiction by owlie gore.

Don

[Pagan Wizard]

Charging a fee to recycle anything is ridiculous. The taxes are too high as it is, and a fee of this sort is just another tax.

Have you replaced the tires on any of your cars lately?? Every retailer that sells and installs tires where I live charges $2.00 USD's for each tire they take from you as a "recycling fee"

I'm just wondering how many of us were given a drop of Mercury to play with in science class?


I am glad I wasn't one of the lucky ones you're talking about there. :eek:

[TheKid]

That's the one exception I could think of. They were charging for taking old tires long before recycling was the norm. In the sixties, it was a buck per tire because the tire stores had to pay to have them removed. I worked in one in the early seventies, and I remember my boss arguing with the guy who picked them up because he raised his rates from 50 cents to 60 cents per tire. Most customers wanted us to keep them because 4 tires wouldn't fit in the trunk, and they didn't want to get their interiors dirty, or they just didn't want to be bothered unloading them from the car and putting them out with the trash. You could still put them out in the trash around here. There were always groups who collected newspapers, but they didn't charge to pick them up.