Good Riddance To The Lightbulb

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

I love LEDs... I doubt they will ever replace main lighting though.

I thought maybe i should explaim why. Lumens..

A 60watt bulb puts out about 800 lumans.

The brightest LED I can find puts out 200 lumens and it's a spot light... and costs $60.

no thank you.

[phee]

I love LEDs... I doubt they will ever replace main lighting though.

I thought maybe i should explaim why. Lumens..

A 60watt bulb puts out about 800 lumans.

The brightest LED I can find puts out 200 lumens and it's a spot light... and costs $60.

no thank you.

I have an LED maglight type flashlight.... it is great!

[Destroit]

I love LEDs... I doubt they will ever replace main lighting though.

I thought maybe i should explaim why. Lumens..

A 60watt bulb puts out about 800 lumans.

The brightest LED I can find puts out 200 lumens and it's a spot light... and costs $60.

no thank you.

Works for me, my gothyness only likes lighting under like 40 watt bulbage, anything more than that and it's just too damn bright.

I didn't paint my whole damn house black just to have it flooded out by bright ass I-think-I'm-dead-and-seeing-the-light kinda light. Kinda ruins the atmosphere...

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

I love those.

It's a flashlight!

It's a club!

and the batterys dont go dead fast.

[phee]

I love those.

It's a flashlight!

It's a club!

and the batterys dont go dead fast.

Indeed

[Head Wreck]

heh heh heh

my latest toy is one of these:

http://www.szwholesale.com/power-3xcree-lu...fc3-p-1071.html

and i've just converted all my old surefires and streamilght M3's to these LED's

[Shade Everdark]

Here comes the other shoe: why haven't I heard anything in this discussion, yet, since we're so concerned about mercury, about mercury emissions from coal-burning? By the numbers, burning coal produces a hell of a lot more particulate mercury than breaking a few dozen CFLs. And CFLs will help reduce how much of that mercury-bearing coal we have to burn. Personally, I'll take that trade.

I'm also seeing a bit of inconsistency here. First, Gaf, you mention that if a CFL breaks, you have to call out a HazMat team to deal with it. Two posts later, you list the EPA's guildelines for cleaning up a broken CFL. Were you just using hyperbole, or what?

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

I've been waiting for that to be brought up. Somehow I knew it was going to be you.

I don't that switching to these bulbs is going to actually affect how much coal is burned for a couple of reasons. The first being human nature... wait... this would be so much easier to talk about if we could actually sit down and chat...

but here goes....

People know these use far less power. So they replace every light in their house. their Bill goes down. they get a warm and fuzzy feeling. They stop turning lights off when not in use. Hell, you can have the house completely lit 24/7 and your bill is still lower than it was with the old style bulbs...

The power plant is still burning coal. In fact, whether you use it or not... that power plant is going to burn a set amount of coal a day and generate the same amount of power a day and emit the same amount of pollution a day. But hey, if 15 or 20 years we wont need that power plant anymore... Really? When did we get a new distribution back bone? When did we stop needing a power generator every so many miles to make sure everyone had power? When did we have extra power plants sitting around? Or power plants working on less than 100% output? Last i heard.. we actually needed more power plants to keep up with our growing needs. I'm not talking about wattage used... I'm talking houses with needs for wattage.

and still... you have cats and kids knocking over lamps and creating a major health hazard in your house.

as for the Haz-mat team. I was using hyperbole. Though to be honest... if you drop one... don;t call the light bulb company.. they will flat out tell you to call in a real haz-mat clean up team. There are a few cases of this happening already with cleanup costs in the thousands.

[ttogreh]

THE REASON THE BILL IS LOWER IS BECAUSE LESS WATTAGE IS CONSUMED!

Less wattage = LESS COAL BURNED.

I am not a farmer, Gaf, I don't need so much bullshit.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

How much electricity is used does not have as much affect on how much is generated as you would like to think.

It's take a certain minimum amount of steam presssure to turn a turbine. That means there is a minimum amount of coal that can be burned and still generate enough steam to turn the turbine.

it's called physics. No amount of politics can change the laws of physics.

We are still going to be heating and cooling our homes. We are still going to be uising computers and TVs.. refrigerators and freezors...

There is a minimum power need.

Our system has no extra. All changing light bulbs does is takes some of the strain off the over worked system we have.

[Msterbeau]

LEDs are nice but the white ones are expensive. At least they are in automotive use. Radio Shack - Red and green are $1.50... White and blue are $5.50. You need a bunch to make decent light. Not sure about energy consumption but they turn on real fast. Why they're being used in brake lamps.

Is this at all relevant? Probably not....

[Hellion]

You can blame this BS corporation for high cost of living and other bs,that has made life miserable for several million ppl here and in other parts of the world.

[ttogreh]

Our system has no extra. All changing light bulbs does is takes some of the strain off the over worked system we have.

YOU ARE INVALIDATING YOUR OWN ARGUMENT, AND YOU CAN'T SEE IT.

Christ in a boxcar...

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

If you say so. Did you read anything other than that one line?

you know, you can be a little dutch boy all you want. Keep your finger in that hole. I'm going to look for a way to fix the damn.

[hunhee]

Hmm.. well Gaf, what I guess they're saying is you're not looking at it from the sense that it takes the same amount of energy to turn the turbine. And you're right no matter how much you look at it, the it's going to have to burn the same amount of coal to turn that turbine a full revolution, but what you seem to be missing on is how many fewer times that turbine has to go around if the demand for the energy isn't there as it once was, thus burning less coal.

Also, if we're only changing light-bulbs once, every five years, that is going to limit the amount of risk the light bulbs will be broken.

[ttogreh]

Indeed, Hunhee.

Moreover, as much as Gaf has discounted the possibility of LED lighting overtaking compact fluorescents, Ann Arbor already has committed herself to using LEDs for her streetlights. Now, the technology for home and business LED lighting is not here. It is going to take a while, but it WILL get here.

People already have embraced the concept of paying more to spend less with CF bulbs. LEDs are not an impossible dream.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

I never said LED's are not do'able. I said they are not do'able right now.

Hunhee: My point is that the amount of coal burned is not going to go down that much. We still have to turn that turbine at a minimum speed.

The net positive affect we will see right away is fewer rolling black outs in Cali and fewer rolling brownouts in places like Florida. Most areas of the country wont see any benefit that outways the risks.

I really wish we could, as a people, stop having knee jerk reactions to fucking everything. Most of our problems that we face are caused by knee jerk reactions to other problems.