Incandescent Bulbs Get a Reprieve

An anonymous reader writes "A new budget deal reached today by the U.S. Congress walks back the energy efficiency standards that would have forced the phase out of incandescent bulbs. 'These ideas were first enacted during the Bush administration, via the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. Incandescent bulbs were unable to meet the standards, so they would eventually be forced off the market in favor of LEDs and compact fluorescent bulbs. But Republicans have since soured on the bill, viewing it as an intrusion on the market and attempting to identify it with President Obama. Recent Congresses have tried many times to repeal the standards, but these have all been blocked. However, U.S. budgets are often used as a vehicle to get policies enacted that couldn't pass otherwise, since having an actual budget is considered too valuable to hold up over relatively minor disputes. The repeal of these standards got attached to the budget and will be passed into law with it.'"

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Bad Summary

[wolfinator]

This legislation does not repeal the new light bulb efficiency standards. It just de-funds them.

AFAIK, this means the law stands, but will not be enforced. Not the same as repeal.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/01/14/heres-a-breakdown-of-whats-in-congress-1-012-trillion-spending-bill/ [washingtonpost.com]

OTOH

[Richy_T]

But the last US incandescent bulb production line already closed down so well done on fighting unemployment there, chaps.

Re:Freakin' Riders.

[Sponge Bath]

Well, Bush signed it into law and now Obama is repealing it. Does that affect your opinion?

Probably not. Obamaphone is the moniker applied to the assistance program started by Reagan and expanded by Bush. The origin of a program does not seem to matter.

Re:Wattage?

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

I assume "hard usage" won't burn out as a porch light every 6 weeks?

I'm old enough to remember the electric company giving out free bulb replacements for burnt out ones (early 1970s). They lasted a lot longer, like indestructible bakelite landline phones you rented.

They stopped because of another government intervention -- a lawsuit by Phillips claiming Edison and others were, by giving them out for free, restraining trade.

So government fucks you and interferes one way or another. God damn, is their no limit to their interfering presience?

Follow the money, AKA follow the politics, AKA follow the money. Somebody, well, two somebodies get their pocket lined, burping up feel-good memes that will, if designed properly, latch your mind and drive you into behaviors wbich support their spread.

It's religion, stripped of the legal power to force itself on you, with that power regained, just stripped of the word "god".

Re:Freakin' Riders.

[jandrese]

Eliminating incandescent bulbs is nobody's priority anymore, because CFCs are getting cheap enough that that they sell themselves, even to poor people who don't have a lot of money to spend on expensive bulbs, and the market penetration is almost universal, except for those situations where CFCs still don't work well.

I think you mean CFLs.

Poor people still won't buy them, because the incandescent ones will still be cheaper. It's one example of why it's so expensive to be poor.

You're all* fucking idiots.

[viperidaenz]

There have always been halogen replacement bulbs. CFL's and LED's are not the only alternative options.

* most of you, not all.

Re:Freakin' Riders.

[icebike]

Yeah, CFLs.

But At prices like these (4 pack for $3.54) [homedepot.com] even people without a lot of money can afford them.

Re:Freakin' Riders.

[ahabswhale]

The new standards are still in place it's just that the bill provides no funding to enforce the standards. It also doesn't preclude these standards from being enforced in the future.

Re:Freakin' Riders.

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

They make no sense and CFL's make a ton of sense.

CFL's take about 30 seconds to come to full brightness. At full brightness, they are still dimmer than incandesants. These are in fact, actual issues with the tecnology.

Re:Freakin' Riders.

[blacksmith_tb]

In 1923, J.B.S. Haldane wrote "Almost all our present sources of light are hot bodies, 95% of whose radiation is invisible. To light a lamp as a source of light is about as wasteful of energy as to burn down one's house to roast one's pork." Future generations will look at almost everything we have done and wonder what we were thinking.

Re: Freakin' Riders.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually they never told you what you can buy, they just stopped the manufacture of them. Frankly you need to get over it too, they were wasteful of energy. Buy a CFL or an LED they last MUCH MUCH longer, and are cheaper in the long run. Don't be penny wise and pound foolish.

Re:Freakin' Riders.

[QuasiSteve]

. At full brightness, they are still dimmer than incandesants

Can't really make that statement without some figures.

I.e. are you talking about a run-of-the-mill incandescent 60W bulb and comparing it to a run-of-the-mill CFL at 9W* (*60W equivalent)?

If so, hey, maybe the manufacturer was lying. Maybe your 60W bulb is throwing out 800lm while the CFL is throwing out 700lm.
So perhaps you need to get th 11W* model (*70W equivalent) that throws out 850lm.

But then you'd be on the other side of the aisle, saying that the CFL is brighter.
Unless, of course, you got a high efficiency incandescent that's actually throwing out 900lm.

There's a reason that they want to add actual light output to bulbs. That's a good thing for exactly this reason. Now add distribution pattern and a little spectrograph (with a CRI number for those who feel CRI is good enough), and things can start to be compared fairly.