Industry wants ban on bulb in Europe

news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070605/ap_on_hi_te/eu_light_bulbs

'standard incandescent light bulbs' are your normal household lightbulbs. So this does not appear to apply to most streetlights or for example security floodlights, though there is a mention of 'efficient halogen lights'.

Its interesting but nothing in there to enforce all street lighting to be FCO, and to have security lights point below the horizon etc.

Cheers,
~Al

BRUSSELS, Belgium - European light-bulb makers said Tuesday they want to phase out the standard incandescent light bulb in eight years, replacing it with more eco-friendly, energy-efficient lamps.

The manufacturers' proposal, submitted to the European Commission, is similar to plans under way or under consideration elsewhere, including Australia, California, and Canada, as governments seek energy savings and green-friendly credentials.

The switch could lead to significant reductions in carbon dioxide emissions from domestic lighting, and savings of $9.4 billion for European consumers, said the European manufacturers. The group includes General Electric Co., Havells Sylvania, and Philips.

The leaders of the 27 European Union nations agreed on new energy and emissions cutting guidelines in March, including phasing out the old incandescent lamps.

Andris Piebalgs, the EU's energy commissioner, welcomed the initiative, saying it showed efficiency "is a way of combatting climate change" and reducing energy dependency across Europe.

The EU is applying new binding minimum energy efficiency rules for all lights used, either in the home, at work, or in street lighting.

The industry group said manufacturers will have eight years to switch to high-efficiency halogen and compact flourescent lamps and develop high-efficiency incandescent bulbs.

"Under the proposal, within eight years from now, 85 percent of the total EU traditional incandescent lamp market of 2.1 billion lamps would need to meet new efficiency requirements," the group said.

It added that the highest watt lamps, those between 25 watts and 100 watts, will be phased out by 2015.

well i suppose it is a step in the right direction. unfortunately people will probably used the "saved" energy to put up more stupid lights lighting up public buildings.

well i suppose it is a step in the right direction. unfortunately people will probably used the "saved" energy to put up more stupid lights lighting up public buildings.

Yea the attitude of 'but is energy efficient I can point it where I like' will be the next attitude to change.

That is pathetic.

In a well heat-insulated house an incandescent light bulb can significantly contribute to the heating of a room.
(It may well be the hottest thing in a given room.)
A 100W light bulb pours around 95 watts of heat into a room.

A 20 watt light bulb can keep the interior of a shed above freezing when it is 40 below outside.(Standard practice in Spitzbergen.)

Seen as a "combined heater/light" an incandescent is FAR more energy efficient than a flourescent.

In cool climates people will compensate by tweaking up the central heating a notch to compensate for that chill.

Nett result....little or no savings at all.

If you stand on the Dublin Mountains and look down at the sheer waste of light energy beaming at you, you will realize how pathetic banning indoor incandescents really is.

The same politicians who come up with this stuff regularly switch on floodlights on government buildings and sports stadia.

Almost ALL Irish government buildings,churches,hotels,monuments etc. are floodlit all night long, all year long.
Including the buildings of the Dept. of the Environment.

Yet these people deign to lecture down us about our little light bulbs.

Peter.

That is pathetic.

In a well heat-insulated house an incandescent light bulb can significantly contribute to the heating of a room.
...

I find it difficult to believe incandescent bulbs are an efficient way to heat a room. Even central electric heaters designed specifically for that purpose usually can't heat a room for the cost of gas, oil or even turf. You might think 95% efficiency of converting electricity to heat is great but think of the power plant where a turbine struggles to reach 35% efficiency in converting heat to electricity. You're barely above 30% efficiency even without considering resistance loss in the power line. Burn the same amount of coal, oil or gas that was burned to run the incandescent bulb in your shed, and you'd probably be able to heat your entire house.

If you stand on the Dublin Mountains and look down at the sheer waste of light energy beaming at you, you will realize how pathetic banning indoor incandescents really is.

The same politicians who come up with this stuff regularly switch on floodlights on government buildings and sports stadia.

Almost ALL Irish government buildings,churches,hotels,monuments etc. are floodlit all night long, all year long.
Including the buildings of the Dept. of the Environment.
...

I'd have to agree with you here except for that it understates Ireland's wastefulness. Many of these lights aren't on just all night long, they are on for 24 hours/day, 7 days/week, 365.242199 days/year. Look up sometime during the longest day of the year, when we get something close to 20 hours of daylight, if you're anywhere within the pale, I'll bet you can find an outdoor light that is wasting oil, spitting out 2.5 pounds/CO2/kwHr and adding a few lumens of useless illumination to the adequate daylight that filters through our clouds. The amount of daylight outdoor illumination in Ireland is astonishing compared with any country I've ever visited (including the poster child for energy hedonism, the U.S.)

A new Tesco warehouse, a mobile phone mast and some other stadium-like white light blight has taken away the last magnitude 3+ quadrant of my night sky over the broadmeadows estuary near Swords, a Dart station car park in a public greenspace threatens to wipe out everything from 2nd magnitude up. So that's why I'm in a bad mood. Grrrr.

How should we celebrate the day when oil passes $100/bbl and people turn off lights they don't need? How should we celebrate when builders stop building for the sake of builders and speculators and start building for people and designing for sustainability? Sidewalk astronomy? A star party? Dancing in the streets?

Look up sometime during the longest day of the year, when we get something close to 20 hours of daylight, if you're anywhere within the pale, I'll bet you can find an outdoor light that is wasting oil, spitting out 2.5 pounds/CO2/kwHr and adding a few lumens of useless illumination to the adequate daylight that filters through our clouds.

Well at night Dublin is now like this: Taken 1st July just afer midnight. And that wasn;t even a very foggy night.

A new Tesco warehouse,

Can you send me some info on that Warehouse. I have a letter from Tesco to Bob Mizon from 1993 where their engineering director in the UK promising that all lighting will be directed downwards. I've never got a reply from Tesco Ireland about this but the letter may be of use if you want to write to them.