Posted on 09/09/2010 7:47:50 AM PDT by Iron Munro
The last General Electric factory in the U.S. to manufacture incandescent light bulbs is set to close its doors next month, as a federal move toward green technology has made the product obsolete, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.
The Winchester, Va., plant partly fell victim to energy conservation legislation passed by Congress that will require Americans to start using more efficient bulbs by 2014, the report said.
The 200 workers at the plant will lose their jobs when the doors shut for the final time, as the replacement bulbs, known as compact fluorescents (CL), are manufactured mainly overseas.
According to the U.S. Department of Energy, CL’s last up to 10 times longer than incandescent bulbs, while using about one-fourth the amount of energy.
"Everybody's jumping on the green bandwagon," The Post quoted Pat Doyle, who has worked at the plant for 26 years, as saying.
“We've been sold out,” Doyle added. “First sold out by the government. Then sold out by GE."
President Barack Obama has put an emphasis on creating green jobs, saying he wants the U.S. to create five million over the next ten years, The Wall Street Journal added.
oven lights? Well, they are those little things that come on when you open the oven door...but thats not important right now... :)
Your experience is not universal.
I have a dozen bulbs in my basement, and the only ones that burn out are the CFLs.
Funny ... I put all lights but one in my basement as CFL.
Five years ago.
Zero CFLs have burned out.
I've replaced the one tungsten bulb four times.
Who's taking you for a ride charging $5 per CFL?
Shhhh, don't give the environuts any ideas.
Shhhh, don't give the environuts any ideas.
My understanding is that a large part of the effort is going into creating a color of light that is acceptable for office and home interiors. Whatever color temperature a normal “white” led emanates - it’s not a pleasing result and they are putting a lot of effort into balancing the color of the led output. The last time I read in detail about it - it seemed that the Japanese were leading the way. Whether that means they will manufacture the product or it will be done elsewhere, I dunno, but I’d be on China, perhaps Brazil.
They are already here and they are very expensive. They can't replace incandescents for decorative applications either.
There are warm spectrum LEDs that make light just as good as incandescents.
90% of your fellow Americans have no idea what is going on here. Can you imagine the uprising the day they finally go to WalMart and find not a single standard bulb for sale?
Let me hop up here on my soapbox.
I dislike CFLs. I think that they're dim, slow to come on, and ridiculously expensive. However, I *do* use them in a place where I *want* a dim light, that never gets turned off, and won't use a lot of electricity (night light, kid's room). So, I can see where they have a use. Ditto LED's. At my parent's house, I replaced a bulb that's damn near impossible to get at, with a $20 LED bulb. Expensive? Sure. But the bulb will last forever, and I'll not need to see my Dad teetering on a book balanced on top of a ladder, replacing that @#$%%$$# bulb again, because "he doesn't want to bother me with it".
Would a full conversion over to them save money on electricity? Maybe some FReepers who've switched can talk about it. However, I'd imagine that - unless you leave the lights on in your house all of the time, and used far, far too many incandescent bulbs at too high a wattage, (or, you pay a ridiculous amount for electricity) I can't imagine that it would save any real money.
Overall, and I'm not talking about just electricity here, the things in your house that suck energy are devices that heat stuff up (think, heaters, dryers, etc) and things that cool stuff off (fridge, AC, freezer). And *especially* things that run 24/7. So, IMHO, if you want to sink money into energy saving devices, skip the CFL's and put up better insulation, or replace the 40-year-old oil furnace in the basement.
If the greenies were serious about saving energy, they'd stop goofing around with lightbulbs - that amounts to splashing in the ocean with a teaspoon. But, after all, this isn't about actually accomplishing anything, it's all about control, and appearances.
/rant off.
Drop an incadesant bulb on the floor, and then you sweep it up. No problem.
Drop a flourescent (green) bulb on the floor and you need to call a hazmat team to clean it up.
We should attack the halls of Congress and throw all our ruined Flourescent bulbs on the steps. See what happens.
***CL’s last up to 10 times longer than incandescent bulbs,***
No they don’t. Maybe twice or three times as long as an incadescent. Dead bulbs also have a warning on the side...”HG” meaning MURCURY is inside the bulb. Call a Hazmat team if you break one and DON’T throw them in the trash (but I do)!
**These so called “green” light bulbs are anything but.***
And one more thing, the “Green” bulbs will not fit all light fixtures. I have a ceiling lamp which takes a 60 watt bulb perfectly, but try to replace it with a “green” bulb and it will screw in and light, but you can’t get the fixture cover back over the bulb. Even going to a smaller bulb like a 45 watt “green” bulb is too big.
Incadescents rule!
**Zero CFLs have burned out.***
I use CFLs in hard to get places in my den. While they do last longer than incadescents, they don’t last more than twice the lifespan. I have had to replace all of them after about one year, including in other areas of the house. They begin to flicker, then comes a “POP” and lights out.
I also have incadescents in my basement and they have NEVER burned out after 16 years. But then, I haven’t run them more than a few hours a month.
Yes, thanks for adding that. I experienced this too, but forgot it in my rant.
Government should never have gotten involved in this issue. The market gets rid of obsolete products much better than the government could ever hope to.
You can still get R-12 in Mexico,have my 30lbs to keep my car cool.
But the new light helps with mercury sale.Brake a new lamp into a pool of six thousand gallons of water and it becomes undrinkable.congress at work for you.
I hate those stupid lights.... I tried them, and hate the light they emit (seems dull to me) and I didn’t see any difference in the utility bill either... and the stupid things are way more expensive than normal bulbs. I’ve started stocking up on the incandescent too... this is just like when the gov stuck their nose in the toilet water level...don’t get me started on THAT!
You know, I was thinking about this..... what is it with “conserving” water? I fully understand if you live in an area prone to drought in the summer months and the resevoirs get low, but over all... if it rains and snows.....and water that goes down the drain is reprocessed how can there be an issue with water running out on the earth?
Amen! that’s exactly the problem here!!! Who the he!! do they think they are that they know better than we do? And I really want to know, have they thought out the consequences of 300 million people using CFLs? ok so the mercury from one is no biggie(according to them) but multiply that.....
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