| Subject: Isn't it more environmentally friendly to go incandescent for its |
Author:
Curmudgeon
|
[
Next Thread |
Previous Thread |
Next Message |
Previous Message
]
Date Posted: 07:50:40 01/25/08 Fri
In reply to:
larry
's message, "Light bulb ban will increase CO2" on 14:44:20 01/22/08 Tue
thermal byproduct, generated in a large and very efficient power plant than make up that thermal energy by burning oil or natural gas in one's relatively inefficient furnace in the basement?
Just wondering.
>gee no wonder i turn on my regular lights in the bath
>room. thay make it a bit warmer in there.
>
>The world has seen that if ever a utopian scheme
>becomes law, that law achieves the opposite of the
>intended utopian effect. Call it "Longman's Lemma" if
>someone else doesn't already claim it. And nowhere can
>that proverbial truth be observed more laughably than
>in Congress' compact fluorescent light bulbs.
>Echoing around my head from some required
>eco-indoctrinaire experience in my educational past
>was this unconnected fact: "Some homes in Sweden are
>heated entirely with incandescent light bulbs." I
>don't remember where I'd heard this; it was being held
>up as an example of what errant Americans could do if
>only we let Bob Villa overwhelm our R-factors and
>insulate our attics properly. In colonial days, we
>were to be ashamed of our immorality; today we are
>supposed to be ashamed of our Owens-Corning.
>
>Anyway, that idea wandered through my mind in search
>of something to connect with.
>
>When it found Congress' latest law on eco-madness,
>click, the light went on.
>
>Regular, Thomas Edison-style, incandescent light bulbs
>throw off a large amount of heat. When you purchase a
>"100-watt" light bulb, that power rating refers to
>what the bulb consumes, not so much what it
>illuminates. Today we are told that a 15- or 20-watt
>compact-fluorescent will produce as much light as a
>100-watt incandescent
>American leftists, intent on hating the chemicals they
>are made from, work very hard to force other people to
>reduce the amount of CO2 emitted during existence.
>Being mostly liberal arts majors, and not engineers,
>these folks have quickly come to equate energy
>efficiency with lower CO2 emission. Based on those
>vague facts, and a strong sense of female social
>emotion, Congress recently passed a law yanking
>incandescent lights from production and replacing them
>all with compact fluorescents. Wisdom has been
>mandated.
>
>The net result, of course, will be more fossil fuels
>burned and more CO2 released. The lemma says so. And
>as a conservative, I'm OK with that and think it's
>funny. But of course, facts shall never intrude on the
>feelings of idealism possessed by the utopian
>instigators of these stupefying laws. But I would
>invite everyone who thinks this Congress is a bunch of
>loonies to laugh at them with me.
>
>Heating a home is far more energy consumptive than
>cooling it. And, according to National Public Radio,
>"on average, heating an American home with natural gas
>produces about 6,400 pounds of carbon dioxide (CO2, a
>major warming gas). Use electricity, and CO2 emissions
>average about 4,700 pounds." One must recognize that
>whereas electric heat comes from a mix of nuclear
>power, coal and other sources, natural gas heating
>comes exclusively from burning things. So, electric
>heat, chiefly because nuclear power produces no
>oxidized carbon, pollutes less.
>
>But how many pounds of C02 does it produce for two
>environmentalists to screw in a light bulb? Well, it's
>about 17 percent more hot air than if you'd asked two
>conservatives to do it. See, if we remove a 100-watt
>incandescent, and replace it with a 20-watt
>compact-fluorescent, the light in the room may not
>dim, but the warmth in that room has been cut by about
>80 watts.
>
>Let's consider an American home at 1,700 square feet,
>using 10 watts per square foot over the course of a
>year for heating, and lit with 30 incandescent,
>100-watt light bulbs. In such a normal home, 17
>percent of the wattage needed for winter heating would
>be supplied by the electric lights, when the lights
>were turned on. If you replace those incandescents
>with compact fluorescents, only 3 percent of the
>average heat necessary to heat the house would now be
>available from the light bulbs.
>
>The conservation of energy points out that if the
>thermostat doesn't change its setting, the lost
>wattage will have to come from your furnace or boiler.
>That means the 2,400 watts you otherwise would have
>been buying from the electric company you would now
>buy from your heating company. The furnace would run
>more often. Your heating bill would go up.
>
>So, a regular natural gas home that would have been
>getting 83 percent of its heat from gas and 17 percent
>of its heat from electric light will now fall to 97
>percent of its heat from gas and 3 percent of its heat
>from electricity. If NPR's statistics are correct,
>that means a home using natural gas and incandescents
>would produce about 1,000 pounds more per year of CO2
>by switching to compact fluorescent bulbs. Since most
>American homes are heated with natural gas, which
>costs less than electricity, it is an economic gain.
>
>So, switching to compact fluorescents will save you
>money, raise the amount of hydrocarbons burned and
>make a mockery of the latest leftist utopian scheme.
>Conservatives should do it, and liberals should avoid
>it. But, of course, if you wanted lighting that
>lowered the humidity, lowered hydrocarbon pollution
>and employed green power from wind farms or solar, the
>Democratic Congress has prevented all that now.
>
>As a conservative, I switched to compact fluorescents
>years ago to make more money and emit more pollution.
>I would encourage conservatives and liberals
>everywhere comply with the new law so they can do the
>same.
[
Next Thread |
Previous Thread |
Next Message |
Previous Message
]
| |
Feedback: 