This has been my opinion for a very long time, that the waste products of
CFL and LED lighting will end up being serious problems to everyone
eventually.
Not only the problems associated with disposal of these lighting products,
but also the pollution from the byproducts of manufacturing them.
How much coal needs to be burned to manufacture an LED or CFL lamp, sort of
assessment.
Also, as wiseasses will say "don't eat the lamps" however most of the
products made in China quickly end up in landfills around the world,
although I suppose it's a delightful fantasy to believe that the liners used
in those pits will never fail and release all those metals, toxins and
plastic residues into water supplies.
Wake the **** up.
Not only are toxins inside LEDs and the glass tubes of CFLs, but also in the
electrolytic capacitors and other components inside these lightling
products.
As China will very likely be manufacturing all this great new technology
will be produced, by the lowest bidder, with the cheapest components
available AND with lead-free solder and any other imaginable manufacturing
shortcuts.. the reliability of these new lamps will probably be shorter than
a decent incandescent lamp.
While the sheep flock to buy the new LED products labeled with statements
like "30 year life" or "50,000 hours average life" they won't even recall
how those thermal windows were pitched as "they'll pay for themselves" when
they made the payment of a couple or several thousand dollars for them.
As those windows have all fallen apart by now, and been replaced with even
more expensive products at higher installation costs, so it's all just water
under the bridge.
The environmental impact of common incandescent lamps will likely be very
small to the problems associated with the newest greatest products.
Glass is still being used for CFLs so the manufacturing energy costs can't
be significantly less.
I have yet to see a CFL lamp last longer than 2 years, and the majority of
them that I've owned haven't come cloe to that (I mark the date on the bases
when I put them into use).
These are CFL lamps of various brands (not the cheapest I could find) that
are packaged as 5 year or 7 year useful life lamps.
I've found LEDs to be very practical for use in flashlights, but they don't
light a room worth a damn.
OTOH, I have a portable worklight with 180 LEDs, and it's hardly more useful
than a common incandescent flashlight of 30 years ago.
Flashlight batteries don't produce power spikes or surges the way AC power
sources do, and without good suppression and/or regulation components
driving up the manufacturing costs, the LED lamps will likely be too easily
damaged to make them practical in many applications.
The other advantage to battery power is it's already low voltage which is
what LEDs operate on.. dropping spiking/surging 120VAC to a low DC voltage
requires stable circuitry.. which is only reliable if better quality
components are used, not bottom of the barrel, minimumally adequate
components.
--
WB
..........
"azotic" wrote in message
...
A study by UC Irvine's Department of Population Health & Disease
Prevention has discovered that LED diodes contain unsafe levels of
carcinogenic toxins. While LED's less energy friendly cousin's, CFLs,
contain a measured amount of mercury, LEDs are laden with lead, arsenic
and a handful of other chemicals that have been linked to different
cancers, neurological damage, kidney disease, hypertension, skin rashes
and other serious illnesses. Not only are these chemicals harmful to
consumers if the bulbs are mishandled or broken, but extracting those
toxins from the earth is a destructive process.
Study Finds LED Light Bulbs Contain Unsafe Levels of Carcinogenic Toxins |
Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World
Best Regards
Tom.
--
http://fija.org/