Lights out for 100w bulbs in UK

Lights out for 100w bulbs in UK

news.bbc.co.uk

100 watt light bulbs are being phased out from shops in a voluntary scheme to persuade people to buy low-energy bulbs.

A European Union report has recommended banning conventional incandescent light bulbs by 2012 to save energy and cut down on greenhouse gas emissions.

(visit the link for the full news article)

I am not sure about anyone out there, but i find that the 100w light bulb is the only one that actually produces enough light for me at night. Dim light gives me a headache within 20 min.

Besides that, i have both Hallogen and incandescent bulbs at home, and not once have the hallogen bulbs given off enough light, and neither has even one of them lasted nearly as long as they are meant to...my incandescent bulbs still outlive them, are cheaper and brighter but more importantly dont give me head aches!

What I found really interesting in the interviews expressed in the link, is that not one person was in favour of these bulbs ...Hmmmmm makes one wonder!

news.bbc.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 1/7/2009 by corvin77]

Oh no, not the greenhouse gas emissions again!


Apologies for the one-liner, but HA.

Just came accross this link detailing some info on how the mercury in Low-energy light bulbs are potentially hazardous if they break, according to the Environment Agency.

Not only that, but these bulbs cannot be disposed of in conventional ways either.

news.bbc.co.uk...

This isn't a case of "incandescent" V "halogen" is it?

Incandescent bulbs ARE a waste of energy and should be replaced with "Flourescent" bulbs instead.

They burn much brighter for an equivalent wattage and the "flicker" that was refered to in the video clip is rubbish imo.

There's some disinfo going on here....it is the BBC after all.

flourescent bulbs emitt copious amounts of ultraviolet radiation which has drasatic effects upon ones health.

they are being installed everywhere even in pre mature baby wards causing the babies to go blind.
its causing incidinces of skin cancer in youngsters.
flourescent bulbs also emitt radiowaves to the tune of 1.4 gighertz,these radiowaves have effects upon calcium ions within your body,causing them to bond together resulting in calcifications even in the brain.
in supermarkets there are literaly 1000s of flourescent lights spewing out ungodly amounts of EM waves,you can literally feel it.
ive even seen full blown uv lights(blacklights) being used as lightsources in public buildings,still got the pic,what is going on!?

why LED lights arnt being used is beyond me,they use even less power than floursecent,are cheaper,less hazerdous and easier to dispose of!,once again strange anti health patterns emmerging!

we are exposed to a trillion times more EM now than a hundred years ago,and everyone wonders why were all getting cancer....time to cut the EM pollution.

I have been stocking up on light bulbs every time I go to the store. I should have enough for about 30 years,lol

The mercury ones give me a headache. I do use them for my porch lights though since I leave them on all night.

I'm all for choice ... but the new bulbs last for years and will reduce my electricity bill. I'm all in favour

reply to post by corvin77


I like incandescent and halogen bulbs.Fluorescent bulbs are about as useful as a cat flap in an elephant house.

I tried them out,and ended up having to have more than one light on just to be able to see what I was doing.Plus you have to wait for them to 'warm up.'(some brands can take over 5min)and they run out in no time at all.

Originally posted by nerbot
This isn't a case of "incandescent" V "halogen" is it?

Incandescent bulbs ARE a waste of energy and should be replaced with "Flourescent" bulbs instead.

They burn much brighter for an equivalent wattage and the "flicker" that was refered to in the video clip is rubbish imo.

There's some disinfo going on here....it is the BBC after all.

Flourescent bulbs give people migraines. Have you ever had a migraine? It's far worse than a normal headache and you get dizzy spells with them and sick on stomach. Yeah, force people to be sick. It's the government's way.

My bedroom has 6 100 watt lights, two blue, two red and two clear.

The two clear lights are just about enough to comfortably light my room whilst I am using the PC or watching tv, I would almost certainly need to remove some of my coloured lights to manage seeing anything...

Why not simply put the 100 watt bubles towards the back of the shop, so people are more likely to choose other bulbs, but still haing the choice.

Many questions come to mind:

1.) Do 2 50-watt bulbs cost more than 1 100-watt bulb?

2.) Do you think sales of multi-bulb lamps/more lamps will increase?

Lamp Sets! They're all the rage

3.) Are 2 burned out 50-watt bulbs 'better for the environment' than 1 100-watt bulb?

4.) Does having more lamps plugged into one outlet reduce the chance of fire? (fires release carbon into the atmosphere) Do mulitple lamps use more or less energy than a single one?

5.) Aren't the environmental risks of "energy saver" lightbulbs greater than incandescent?

ENVIRONETDAILY
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: April 16, 2007

Consumers in dark over
risks of new light bulbs
Push for energy-saving fluorescents
ignores mercury disposal hazards

With everyone from Al Gore to Wal-Mart to the Environmental Protection Agency promoting CFLs as the greatest thing since, well, the light bulb, consumers have been left in the dark about a problem they will all face eventually – how to get rid of the darn things when they burn out or, worse yet, break.

CFLs are all the rage. They are the spirally shaped, long-lasting bulbs everyone is being urged, cajoled and guilt-tripped into purchasing to replace Thomas Edison's incandescents, which are being compared to sports utility vehicles for their impracticality and energy inefficiency. However, there is no problem disposing of incandescents when their life is over. You can throw them in the trash can and they won't hurt the garbage collector. They won't leech deadly compounds into the air or water. They won't kill people working in the landfills.

The same cannot be said about the mercury-containing CFLs. They bear disposal warnings on the packaging. But with limited recycling prospects and the problems experienced by Brandy Bridges sure to be repeated millions of times, some think government, the green community and industry are putting the cart before the horse marketing the new technology so ferociously."

- www.wnd.com...

6.) Why do my "lasts up to 10 years energy saver" lightbulbs burn out in five months?

People turn on as many lights as they need until they feel it is "bright enough"...unfortunately the regulator's thinking seems a bit dim on this one. Maybe they need a 100-watt lightbulb going off over their heads.

When the bulb she was installing in a ceiling fixture of her 7-year-old daughter's bedroom crashed to the floor and broke into the shag carpet, she wasn't sure what to do. Knowing about the danger of mercury, she called Home Depot, the retail outlet that sold her the bulbs.

According to the Ellison American, the store warned her not to vacuum the carpet and directed her to call the poison control hotline in Prospect, Maine. Poison control staffers suggested she call the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the Maine Department of Environmental Protection.

The latter sent over a specialist to test the air in her house for mercury levels. While the rest of the house was clear, the area of the accident was contaminated above the level considered safe. The specialist warned Bridges not to clean up the bulb and mercury powder by herself – recommending a local environmental cleanup firm.

That company estimated the cleanup cost, conservatively, at $2,000. And, no, her homeowners insurance won't cover the damage.

Yay energy saver?

Cavaet Emptor

[edit on 7-1-2009 by saint4God]

Originally posted by Niall197
I'm all for choice ... but the new bulbs last for years and will reduce my electricity bill. I'm all in favour

Thats the problem

a voluntary scheme to persuade people to buy low-energy bulbs

Where is the choice here? They talk about voluntary scheme to persuade? Common, it's taking away any other choice!

Forgetting about the migraines, I also suffer from Seasonal change disorder, and in winter, I really need bright lights to just keep me sane lol!

reply to post by saint4God


Just WOW!! Can you believe it lol, having to foot a bill of $2000 to just de-contaminate the immediate area of mercury caused by the broken lightbulb??

This is fishy as hell...I wonder if this is one of those "Follow the money" situations!

Originally posted by corvin77
Just WOW!! Can you believe it lol, having to foot a bill of $2000 to just de-contaminate the immediate area of mercury caused by the broken lightbulb??

This is fishy as hell...I wonder if this is one of those "Follow the money" situations!

I think what happened here was someone was trying to do 'the right thing' which lead down a trail of notifying a redtape organization to do a giant project for a small problem. My guess is after she had been given that estimate, she grabbed a $5 dustmask or a $15 gasmask, opened the windows, put a $10 box fan in it, and vacuumed the crap up. That's what I would've done. As long as the child wasn't licking the rug I'm sure safety isn't that much of a concern. The mercury in the tuna we buy is another story...

Originally posted by saint4God
The mercury in the tuna we buy is another story...

Off Topic!! But yeah, what is up with that? What is the purpose of the mercury in the tuna cans?

Something im gonna start looking into for sure!!

Originally posted by Niall197
I'm all for choice ... but the new bulbs last for years and will reduce my electricity bill. I'm all in favour

I read that the incandescent bulbs would/could last up to 5 yrs. I bought a bunch of them and found they last about as long as a regular bulb in my house. So, I switched back to the regular bulbs. I never use 100 watt bulbs. I generally use 60-75 watts.

I think you will find this is happening world wide slowly enough.
They used to have huge packs of 100w normal light bulbs now you can buy only like a 2 pack.
Slowly they will phase out from making normal light bulbs and just make the low energy ones.
Apparently its bad to use to much energy because of the proven fake Al Gore global warming emergency.
Of course the facts that energy companies increase prices and announce larger profits due to this is completely irrelevant isn't it.

Originally posted by corvin77
Off Topic!! But yeah, what is up with that? What is the purpose of the mercury in the tuna cans?

Something im gonna start looking into for sure!!

It's off topic in that we're talking about tuna, but making the point that mercury ingested is probably more harmful than mercury dust on your carpet.

Canned light tuna, long recommended as the safer choice because of its presumably lower mercury content, sometimes harbors at least as much of that potentially harmful heavy metal as white tuna does, our analysis of Food and Drug Administration data has shown. That finding raises new concerns about the safety of canned tuna for pregnant women.

Some canned light tuna may contain yellowfin, which tends to have much more mercury than skipjack, the type usually found in cans labeled as light.

The FDA has not warned consumers about those occasionally higher mercury levels because it believes the levels don't pose any significant threat, according to David Acheson, M.D., the chief medical officer at the agency's Center for Food Safety & Applied Nutrition. "If you eat a single can of something that's a little higher than the average, it's not going to do any acute harm," Acheson said when we asked him about fetal safety.

Oh really? Have we studied the long term effects on the nervous system and cancers as related to mercury? If it's no threat, why the warnings on lightbulbs and thermometers?

But Consumer Reports' fish-safety experts note that some cans are much higher in mercury than average.

Mercury is a heavy metal, naturally present in rocks and soil, that gets into the environment mainly from emissions generated by coal-burning power plants and waste incinerators. Small amounts are also released as soil and rocks break down or during disposal of products that contain mercury, such as fluorescent light bulbs and certain thermometers. Mercury eventually reaches the oceans and rivers, where bacteria convert it to a more toxic form of the metal, which then accumulates in long-lived predatory fish, including tuna. Indeed, consumption of fish is the primary source of mercury in Americans' bodies.

The same weekly intake that's considered safe for women of childbearing age who are not pregnant--roughly three cans of chunk-light tuna or one can of solid-light or white--is almost surely safe for men and older women as well. They can quite likely eat more than that without harm, but the exact amounts are not known".

"

- Consumer Reports

Ladies and gentlemen, would you put on your seatbelt if it almost worked? Would you plug in Christmas lights that would quite likely not burn down your house?

Tossing mercury bulbs away probably does have an effect on the run-off ground water and consequently fish.

[edit on 9-1-2009 by saint4God]