"David Hansen" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 9 Sep 2010 01:52:49 +0100 someone who may be "Arfa Daily"
wrote this:-
Which is all jolly nice if you only address the situation from the
end-user
point of view.
It wasn't me who came up with those figures.
But you were happy to quote them ...
Things would change dramatically against the CFL argument, if
the hugely different energy and monetary costs of manufacturing, shipping,
and correctly disposing of them over the humble and simple incandescent
bulb, were genuinely factored into the equation. However, I suspect that
this would be so complex to do, that it's never going to *actually* get
done, so there will never be any true comparative figures.
Such figures will have been produced. Were I to make the time to
find some you would probably dismiss them in a sentence, so I'll not
bother. The figurs/links below are ones I had on my web browser
anyway, so they didn't take time to look up.
I'm sure that there are figures out there, but it is doubtful whether any
would actually be *truly* accurate, because many hundreds of processes and
shipping routes would have to be factored in, which would be an almost
impossible task to do accurately. Every last one of these processes is
valid, and contributes - however insignificantly - to the total energy
budget consumed by the manufacturing and transporting of a CFL before it
ever gets to your light fitting, and the proper disposal and recycling of it
after a fails anything from a day to 10 years after you install it. It is
this 'hidden' energy cost that is conveniently ignored by the advocates of
the technology. A conventional light bulb on the other hand, uses only a
fraction of the material and manufacturing processes and shipping routes, so
it would be comparatively easy to produce *true* manufacturing and disposal
costs, for that particular technology.
They are being
hugely subsidised by money being collected from us all, as part of our
electricity bills.
"The annual cost per bill for each scheme was £1.20 (EESOP), £3.20
(EEC1) and £9 (EEC2) excluding VAT".
http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/publications/downloads/DomesticEnergyPriceAnalysis.pdf
But that's still millions and millions being collected in to subsidise a
substitute technology that has not, despite what you think and say, been
well received over the last 30 years by the general public at large. If
everyone thought it was so good and necessary, they would be happy to pay
the extra. Instead, only a small minority *do* think it's ok, which has led
to a slow and unenthusiastic take-up at the 'real' price, necessitating this
nannying by the back door on price, and legislative banning, to try to
persuade - read *force* - people to buy them.
And on the subject of sustainable electricity generation, the ugly noisy
windmills that are sprouting up all over the countryside to distract
drivers
and cause more deaths on the roads
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Oh dear ...
Having been to some of the largest wind farms in the UK I have a
little idea about noise. There is certainly some machinery noise if
one stands directly under the nacelle. By about 10 metres from the
base of the tower it is inaudible. Noise from the blades can be
heard further away, but by the time one is the height of the top of
the blade away one cannot hear it. With a large wind farm, if close
enough one can typically hear noise from the nearest turbine or two
but no others. From outside a wind farm the sound of tractors is the
loudest sound, then other motor vehicles, then humans speaking, then
sheep and then birds. The noise of the wind in the trees is louder
than the noise of the wind farm
Many things could "distract" drivers, including all sorts of things
in the countryside like fields, animals and buildings. The road
"safety" lobby used to remove "dangerous" trees, but campaigning has
reduced this. I did once go to the trouble of debunking one of the
well known anti-wind lists of deaths they claimed were caused by
wind generation. A handful of "distraction" deaths, half of which
were people crashing into lorries carrying parts of wind turbines.
If they had instead crashed into lorries carrying coal or parts of a
steam turbine would the same people have made a fuss about all those
people killed by coal generation? I very much doubt it.
have, I believe, been the subject of
studies which show that at best, each one will only just about pay the
energy costs used to build it and maintain it over its lifetime.
Instead of believing in "studies" why not take a look at the reports
Vestas commissioned. They are at the bottom of
http://www.vestas.com/en/about-vestas/sustainability/wind-turbines-and-the-environment/life-cycle-assessment-%28lca%29.aspx
I imagine they will be dismissed in a sentence, but a few other
people who I have pointed to the reports have been open enough to
tell me that they covered everything they could think of and seemed
accurate.
I'm sure that you will dismiss the newspaper that this :
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...cle6954565.ece
appeared in as being another rag that just tells lies to its readers, but
this article is just one taken at random, from many. Just because you can't
hear the subsonic noise that these things make after a visit or two to wind
farms, don't be so arrogant as to dismiss the miseries of people who have to
live near the dreadful things, and put up with the noises that they *do*
make under different weather conditions, every day - and more importantly
night. The amount of power that they generate for the amount of disruption
that they cause, is vanishingly small. What did it say at the bottom of the
article ? Three and a half gigawatts for 250 of them, was it ? That is a
joke in the grand scheme of things. And to suggest that they are no more
distracting to drivers than a field of cows, is such crass nonsense, I can't
believe you even said it.
Nuclear power is by far and away the most sustainable form of electricity
production,
Ignoring all the other problems it can only be sustained until the
uranium runs out. The idea of extracting it from the sea is a
variant of perpetual motion machines.
That's like saying when electricity generation was first invented, we'd
better not do it, because it will only work until the coal / gas runs out.
The amount of uranium used is very small and lasts a very long time. The
latest nuclear sub built by this country, employs a reactor which uses only
a couple of kilos of the stuff, but has an equivalent power output to that
required to "power a city the size of Portsmouth" according to the naval
commissioning engineer that was interviewed about it on the programme about
building the sub. Of course uranium will *eventually* run out, but in the
meantime, it is the most viable alternative to fossil fueled generation
plants. Joke technologies like wind and solar, are only valid in the minds
of the 'save the earth' brigade. In terms of effective use of resources,
they're not even on this planet, let alone in the right ball park ...
Arfa
--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000...#pt3-pb3-l1g54