Halogen lamps are inefficient for lighting, but I like the spotlight
effect very much (especially the smaller ones). Is there any way to
recreate that with more efficient types of lighting? I've doubts about
it, at least for the small sizes.

Seb

On 2006-08-23 20:52:03 +0100, said:

Halogen lamps are inefficient for lighting, but I like the spotlight
effect very much (especially the smaller ones). Is there any way to
recreate that with more efficient types of lighting? I've doubts about
it, at least for the small sizes.

Seb

They are not inefficient at all.

It depends on your criteria and scale of values.

If you measure efficiency as being light out vs. electricity in then
that may well be a factor.

If you measure it in terms of aesthetic benefit vs. cost employed then
they are highly efficient.

On Wed, 23 Aug 2006 21:19:43 +0100 someone who may be Andy Hall
wrote this:-

They are not inefficient at all.

Yet you then go on to contradict this assertion.

It depends on your criteria and scale of values.

Everything does.

If you measure efficiency as being light out vs. electricity in then
that may well be a factor.

In other words they are inefficient.

If you measure it in terms of aesthetic benefit vs. cost employed then
they are highly efficient.

Beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder, but that is nothing to
do with efficiency.


--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00023--e.htm#54

wrote:

Halogen lamps are inefficient for lighting,

around 4% istr

but I like the spotlight
effect very much (especially the smaller ones). Is there any way to
recreate that with more efficient types of lighting? I've doubts about
it, at least for the small sizes.

No. The nearest one can get is to use lower power halogen
downlighters/whatever and make up the difference with more discreet fl
or cfl lighting. Power can drop to 1/2 to 1/3 this way, so it makes a
fair difference.

Yes technically... there are other ways too.


NT

On 2006-08-23 22:16:36 +0100, David Hansen
said:

On Wed, 23 Aug 2006 21:19:43 +0100 someone who may be Andy Hall
wrote this:-

They are not inefficient at all.

Yet you then go on to contradict this assertion.

No I don't



It depends on your criteria and scale of values.

Everything does.

If you measure efficiency as being light out vs. electricity in then
that may well be a factor.

In other words they are inefficient.

No they aren't. It depends on your criteria for efficiency. If
something is completely worthless because it doesn't meet the basic
criteria of acceptability, then it is inefficient. It can't possibly
ever achieve any greater status than that.



If you measure it in terms of aesthetic benefit vs. cost employed then
they are highly efficient.

Beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder, but that is nothing to
do with efficiency.

Nothing to do with beauty.

If something doesn't meet basic acceptability requirements, it is
inefficient. To be precise, efficiency is zero.

In article . com,
wrote:
Halogen lamps are inefficient for lighting, but I like the spotlight
effect very much (especially the smaller ones). Is there any way to
recreate that with more efficient types of lighting? I've doubts about
it, at least for the small sizes.

At the moment, no. LEDs may in the future.

--
*With her marriage she got a new name and a dress.*

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article . com,
wrote:
Halogen lamps are inefficient for lighting, but I like the spotlight
effect very much (especially the smaller ones). Is there any way to
recreate that with more efficient types of lighting? I've doubts about
it, at least for the small sizes.

At the moment, no. LEDs may in the future.

--
*With her marriage she got a new name and a dress.*

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Yes I remember something--but so far the advice is that if you don't
need light in a specific colour other than white (which LEDs do), other
forms of lighting are more efficient.
Well I guess related to a post I made ages ago--incandescent lighting
is not completely inefficient in a heated building--some of the 'waste'
heat is 'recycled' to heat the building.

Seb

On 23 Aug 2006 16:42:32 -0700 someone who may be
wrote this:-

Well I guess related to a post I made ages ago--incandescent lighting
is not completely inefficient in a heated building--some of the 'waste'
heat is 'recycled' to heat the building.

Only when heating is necessary. Even then it is a very expensive way
of providing heat.


--
David Hansen, Edinburgh
I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00023--e.htm#54

On Thu, 24 Aug 2006 08:19:54 +0100, David Hansen
wrote:

|On 23 Aug 2006 16:42:32 -0700 someone who may be
|wrote this:-
|
|Well I guess related to a post I made ages ago--incandescent lighting
|is not completely inefficient in a heated building--some of the 'waste'
|heat is 'recycled' to heat the building.
|
|Only when heating is necessary. Even then it is a very expensive way
|of providing heat.

For at least six to nine months each year, at least where I live 750 ft
above sea level in Yorkshire.
--
Dave Fawthrop dave hyphenologist co uk Google Groups is IME the *worst*
method of accessing usenet. GG subscribers would be well advised get a
newsreader, say Agent, and a newsserver, say news.individual.net. These
will allow them: to see only *new* posts, a killfile, and other goodies.

A couple of points:

Low voltage halogens are ~twice as efficient as mains voltage, so start
there. Also Osram do a range of so called IRC bulbs which are more
efficient again. As a guide to relative efficiency the best measure is
lumens out per W of electricity. Things can get confusing with halogens
as often the makers quote outputs in Candela not lumens. The problem is
that Candelas is a brightness measurement not a light output so you can
get a bigger number by making the light more focused, i.e. a 38degree
flood will have less candelas than a 6degree spot although the total
light output is the same. As a rough guide:

Mains halogen ~10 lumens/W
Incandescent ~13 lumens/W
Low voltage halogen ~20 lumens/W
High efficiency low voltage halogen ~25 lumens/W
Compact fluorescent ~40-60 lumens/W (depends on colour rendering
properties)
Tube fluorescent ~60-70 lumens/W (depends on colour again)

The colour of white light is measured in terms of a CRI (Colour
Rendering Index) where 100 represents the colour of a pure tungsten
filament. The CRI is a measure of the ability of a light source to
accurately represent colour. For example sodium lamps have very high
efficiency (approaching 200 lumens/W) but diabolical CRI which is why
everything appears as shades of orange. Halogens have very good CRI so
the colours of objects appear to be the same as in daylight.
Fluorescents vary greatly depending on manufacturer, price and
efficiency, generally better CRI means lower efficiency.

This makes halogens a good choice for kitchens and places where you
want colours to be vibrant i.e. red peppers to be red rather than
orange.

You shouldn't get CRI mixed up with colour temperature as this is
something else entirely and describes what the light itself is like to
look at rather than the colour properties of illumination by it. You
can have two lamps with the same colour temperature but very different
CRI. Colour temperature relates to the colour of light that would be
emitted from an object at that temperature. So while we would generally
desribe blue-ish white as being 'cool' in fact it has a higher colour
temperature than say a candle which we would describe as 'warm'.

The terminology is on the whole bloody confusing, but anyway fit
halogens, but just make sure they are low voltage not crappy mains
ones, which have shorter bulb life as well.

Fash

They are not inefficient at all.

It depends on your criteria and scale of values.

Clearly, inefficient was intended in its scientific sense, i.e. that of
providing the maximum useful energy out for the minimum energy in.

If you measure it in terms of aesthetic benefit vs. cost employed then
they are highly efficient.

But very environmentally unfriendly. Bulbs should immediately have a scale
of taxes applied in relation to their energy efficiency rating. They are
already rated A-G and it works well enough with cars. I would say no
additional tax for Band A, rising to about 10 pounds a bulb for Band G.

Then all those wastrels who insist on needless polluting the environment
just because they whine on about liking inefficient lightbulbs can at least
pay more than proportionally extra for the priviledge of destroying the
planet.

Christian.

But very environmentally unfriendly.

In the context of all the other uses of energy, a drop in the bucket.

Very much not the case. A huge proportion of CO2 emissions are from vanity
lightbulbs.

Then all those wastrels who insist on needless polluting the environment
just because they whine on about liking inefficient lightbulbs can at
least pay more than proportionally extra for the priviledge of destroying
the planet.

That's already done, by implication, via VAT on the electricity used, if
the energy use really is that significant.

No. That would be proportional. I'm all in favour of making the charge
disproportionate. This allows the measure to not affect those (including
less wealthy people) who choose to use efficient methods, whilst providing a
significant tax burden to those who wish to make a display of environmental
destruction beyond that which is reasonable.

Christian.

Christian McArdle wrote:
They are not inefficient at all.

It depends on your criteria and scale of values.

Clearly, inefficient was intended in its scientific sense, i.e. that of
providing the maximum useful energy out for the minimum energy in.

If you measure it in terms of aesthetic benefit vs. cost employed then
they are highly efficient.

But very environmentally unfriendly. Bulbs should immediately have a scale
of taxes applied in relation to their energy efficiency rating. They are
already rated A-G and it works well enough with cars. I would say no
additional tax for Band A, rising to about 10 pounds a bulb for Band G.

Then all those wastrels who insist on needless polluting the environment
just because they whine on about liking inefficient lightbulbs can at least
pay more than proportionally extra for the priviledge of destroying the
planet.


But they do anyway.

Through increased electricity bills.

The fact that electricity bills (here) are something like 1/10th of the
oil bill needed to heat the place, shows that bulbs are not the biggest
source of carbon dioxide pollution in the average house. The fact that
the CFL's cost about ten times what the ordinary bulb does indicates
SOMETHING about its energy of manufacture, too.




Christian.

The fact that electricity bills (here) are something like 1/10th of the
oil bill needed to heat the place, shows that bulbs are not the biggest
source of carbon dioxide pollution in the average house. The fact that the
CFL's cost about ten times what the ordinary bulb does indicates SOMETHING
about its energy of manufacture, too.

I can assue you that you don't have the average house.

Energy of manufacture of bulbs is tiny compared with the energy they emit
during their lifetimes, but you are right to indicate that this should
always be included in any comparison. Although not affecting the bottom line
in bulb comparisons, they because very significant in comparing electric and
hybrid cars, which do not cut the mustard, IMO.

Christian.

On 2006-08-24 11:02:29 +0100, "Christian McArdle"
said:

They are not inefficient at all.

It depends on your criteria and scale of values.

Clearly, inefficient was intended in its scientific sense, i.e. that of
providing the maximum useful energy out for the minimum energy in.

If you measure it in terms of aesthetic benefit vs. cost employed then
they are highly efficient.

But very environmentally unfriendly.

In the context of all the other uses of energy, a drop in the bucket.


Bulbs should immediately have a scale of taxes applied in relation to
their energy efficiency rating. They are already rated A-G and it works
well enough with cars. I would say no additional tax for Band A, rising
to about 10 pounds a bulb for Band G.

Then all those wastrels who insist on needless polluting the
environment just because they whine on about liking inefficient
lightbulbs can at least pay more than proportionally extra for the
priviledge of destroying the planet.

Christian.

That's already done, by implication, via VAT on the electricity used,
if the energy use really is that significant.

Christian McArdle wrote:
The fact that electricity bills (here) are something like 1/10th of the
oil bill needed to heat the place, shows that bulbs are not the biggest
source of carbon dioxide pollution in the average house. The fact that the
CFL's cost about ten times what the ordinary bulb does indicates SOMETHING
about its energy of manufacture, too.

I can assue you that you don't have the average house.


Indeed I do not, but I do think before you sharpen that axe some more,
you should at least do the sums on your own house.

Lighting is probably the least of my domestic expenditures of the
electrical flavour. I would say that fridges and freezers run to more
than that.


And the other 'permanently on' stuff is not insignificant either..PABX,
router, printers, TV head amp, etc...


I do use CFLS where I can, more because they last longer though, and
cost less to buy when amortized over the life span.

Energy of manufacture of bulbs is tiny compared with the energy they emit
during their lifetimes, but you are right to indicate that this should
always be included in any comparison. Although not affecting the bottom line
in bulb comparisons, they because very significant in comparing electric and
hybrid cars, which do not cut the mustard, IMO.


Well I won;t disagree there.

However I still think that the largest single places to tackle domestic
energy expenditure are heating and the domestic car.

Here those two together can amount to a shatteringly high figure.

We simply don't drive when we can shop online...and try to modulate
heating..which leads me to another post I am about to make.


Christian.

Lighting is probably the least of my domestic expenditures of the
electrical flavour. I would say that fridges and freezers run to more than
that.

You would be surprised. When I first swapped all our incandescent bulbs for
CFLs, in about 1996, I measured the electricity usage before and after. The
electricity usage went down to 60% of its previous value. Therefore, we
concluded that lighting was about 50% of our electrical usage. The gas bill
was about the same as the electric, so I suspect, making a guess that gas
provides more CO2 emissions than electricity on a cost basis), that wasteful
lighting was emitting a good sixth of the house CO2 emissions. If everyone
changed, that would be an extremely substantial benefit.

Lighting is probably the least of my domestic expenditures of the
electrical flavour. I would say that fridges and freezers run to more than
that.

And the other 'permanently on' stuff is not insignificant either..PABX,
router, printers, TV head amp, etc...

You should note that our house had no multiple halogen fittings or such
like. Every room was lit by a single incandescent bulb in the middle. A
halogen equiped house is likely to spend well over half the electricity bill
on lighting. A fridge probably only draws about 100W over a continuous
period. Little electronic devices probably only a couple of watts each.
Nothing compared to lightbulbs, which are often continuously lit throughout
the day, especially in winter.

Christian.

It might be if it were unreasonable use of electricity, but it isn't.
Other uses are far more significant.

And should be tackled also. I'm not one to pick and choose. However,
lighting IS a very significant use of CO2. OK, the bulbs don't use as much
as many appliances, but they are on for hours at a time. At least a third
and possibly more than a half of electricty use in a house goes on lighting
when using incandescent bulbs. When people have obscene halogen room
lighting throughout, often in excess of 500W per room, lighting can
absolutely dwarf the other electrical usages. Often these are the same
houses that get so hot in summer from the lighting, that people insist on
installing air conditioning to take away the heat!

There is no need for wasteful lighting as low energy alternatives exist.
Therefore, punitive taxation should be applied for wasteful methods. I would
like to see this principle consistently applied to all energy usage, where
it can be practically applied and where low energy alternatives exist.

Christian.

Hello,

At tp24 we don't yet have a low energy alternative for small halogen
capsule lamps but there is a low energy downlight product available.
It's designed to replace standard mains voltage 50w halogen downlights.
http://www.tp24.com/rio

The technology involved in making CFL lamps is improving, and they are
getting smaller, so other halogen replacements will become available in
the future.

LED lamps might get there first. We don't think that they are suitable
yet for 'whole room lighting' - there just isn't enough light.

Andrew
tp24

On 2006-08-24 11:28:32 +0100, "Christian McArdle"
said:

But very environmentally unfriendly.

In the context of all the other uses of energy, a drop in the bucket.

Very much not the case. A huge proportion of CO2 emissions are from
vanity lightbulbs.

Figures?


Then all those wastrels who insist on needless polluting the
environment just because they whine on about liking inefficient
lightbulbs can at least pay more than proportionally extra for the
priviledge of destroying the planet.

That's already done, by implication, via VAT on the electricity used,
if the energy use really is that significant.

No. That would be proportional. I'm all in favour of making the charge
disproportionate. This allows the measure to not affect those
(including less wealthy people) who choose to use efficient methods,
whilst providing a significant tax burden to those who wish to make a
display of environmental destruction beyond that which is reasonable.

Christian.

It might be if it were unreasonable use of electricity, but it isn't.
Other uses are far more significant.

Fash wrote:

A couple of points:

Low voltage halogens are ~twice as efficient as mains voltage, so start
there.

Hold on, there is more to it. The lightbulbs themselves, if 12v, are a
bit more efficient, but the way theyre almost always used is
murderously inefficient. So in practice 12v halogen lights are on
average much bigger energy guzzlers than GLS.

So dont start there at all, its the worst of all options. Halogens are
also the highest fire risk of all lighting types, and have other issues
too.


Mains halogen ~10 lumens/W
Incandescent ~13 lumens/W
Low voltage halogen ~20 lumens/W
High efficiency low voltage halogen ~25 lumens/W
Compact fluorescent ~40-60 lumens/W (depends on colour rendering
properties)
Tube fluorescent ~60-70 lumens/W (depends on colour again)

If this is translated into cost per annum people get a shock when they
see those halogen costs, the highest by far. In short halogen
downlighting will cost thousands to run. I wish that were an
exaggeration.


The colour of white light is measured in terms of a CRI (Colour
Rendering Index) where 100 represents the colour of a pure tungsten
filament. The CRI is a measure of the ability of a light source to
accurately represent colour. For example sodium lamps have very high
efficiency (approaching 200 lumens/W) but diabolical CRI which is why
everything appears as shades of orange. Halogens have very good CRI so
the colours of objects appear to be the same as in daylight.
Fluorescents vary greatly depending on manufacturer, price and
efficiency, generally better CRI means lower efficiency.

This makes halogens a good choice for kitchens and places where you
want colours to be vibrant i.e. red peppers to be red rather than
orange.

no it doesnt. Many CFL and linear fl also have good CCT and high CRI,
and win by miles in other respects.


re LEDs, theyre still gimmick lighting at this time. Maybe one day, but
certainly not today, not for normal household uses.


NT

Christian McArdle wrote:

It might be if it were unreasonable use of electricity, but it isn't.
Other uses are far more significant.

And should be tackled also. I'm not one to pick and choose. However,
lighting IS a very significant use of CO2. OK, the bulbs don't use as much
as many appliances, but they are on for hours at a time. At least a third
and possibly more than a half of electricty use in a house goes on lighting
when using incandescent bulbs. When people have obscene halogen room
lighting throughout, often in excess of 500W per room, lighting can
absolutely dwarf the other electrical usages. Often these are the same
houses that get so hot in summer from the lighting, that people insist on
installing air conditioning to take away the heat!

There is no need for wasteful lighting as low energy alternatives exist.
Therefore, punitive taxation should be applied for wasteful methods. I would
like to see this principle consistently applied to all energy usage, where
it can be practically applied and where low energy alternatives exist.

Christian.

I quite agree with the points you make. But there is one basic problem.
Since there are other reasonable viewpoints as well, is it really a
good idea for one camp to force others to live by its views? If you
vote yes to that, youre voting for others to force their views onto you
too. It cuts both ways. You'd effectively indirectly be voting for part
p and other such crap.

IMHO nannying and dumbifying is the cause of a lot of problems in
British society today.


NT

I quite agree with the points you make. But there is one basic problem.
Since there are other reasonable viewpoints as well, is it really a
good idea for one camp to force others to live by its views? If you
vote yes to that, youre voting for others to force their views onto you
too. It cuts both ways. You'd effectively indirectly be voting for part
p and other such crap.

Well, to take a contrary view would require you to agree to anarchy.

IMHO nannying and dumbifying is the cause of a lot of problems in
British society today.

I don't like the term nannying. It is used by right wingers to scare people
and justify all sorts of crap, like the right to torture animals, blow smoke
in my face and needlessly destroy the planet.

Christian.

The trouble is that the alternatives are not at all attractive.....

They're not that bad. It's not like you have to go with Ikea special stick
bulbs.

There is no need for wasteful lighting as low energy alternatives exist.

But not aesthetically acceptable. Until that happens, these are not
viable alternatives.

But why should you be allowed to needlessly pollute just because you prefer
the look of older bulbs, which are actually not more attractive than many
CFLs, just slightly different.

There's more than enough taxation already and this would simply promote a
black market in light bulbs or people would pay the money.

The majority would just buy the CFLs. I can't see lots of people coming back
with 20 packs of light bulbs through the channel tunnel, like they do for
ciggies. Particularly as the alternative will actually save many times their
purchase cost in electricity.

Christian.

wrote:
Fash wrote:

A couple of points:

Low voltage halogens are ~twice as efficient as mains voltage, so start
there.

Hold on, there is more to it. The lightbulbs themselves, if 12v, are a
bit more efficient, but the way theyre almost always used is
murderously inefficient. So in practice 12v halogen lights are on
average much bigger energy guzzlers than GLS.

So dont start there at all, its the worst of all options. Halogens are
also the highest fire risk of all lighting types, and have other issues
too.

The point is that the mains ones are used in exactly the same way as
low voltage halogens so if you want halogens use low voltage not mains.

Mains halogen ~10 lumens/W
Incandescent ~13 lumens/W
Low voltage halogen ~20 lumens/W
High efficiency low voltage halogen ~25 lumens/W
Compact fluorescent ~40-60 lumens/W (depends on colour rendering
properties)
Tube fluorescent ~60-70 lumens/W (depends on colour again)

If this is translated into cost per annum people get a shock when they
see those halogen costs, the highest by far. In short halogen
downlighting will cost thousands to run. I wish that were an
exaggeration.


The colour of white light is measured in terms of a CRI (Colour
Rendering Index) where 100 represents the colour of a pure tungsten
filament. The CRI is a measure of the ability of a light source to
accurately represent colour. For example sodium lamps have very high
efficiency (approaching 200 lumens/W) but diabolical CRI which is why
everything appears as shades of orange. Halogens have very good CRI so
the colours of objects appear to be the same as in daylight.
Fluorescents vary greatly depending on manufacturer, price and
efficiency, generally better CRI means lower efficiency.

This makes halogens a good choice for kitchens and places where you
want colours to be vibrant i.e. red peppers to be red rather than
orange.

no it doesnt. Many CFL and linear fl also have good CCT and high CRI,
and win by miles in other respects.

It makes them a good choice but not the only choice.

Regarding CCT and CRI of fluorescents I absolutely agree, but only if
you buy the right ones. I'm about to fit out the lights for a basement
room which has very limited natural daylight (wouldn't meet current
building regs but it's been in use as a habitable room since before
building regs were thought of). I'm planning to use daylight spectrum
fluorescents (tubes) for the main daytime lighting for exactly the
reasons you give. However I'm still planning to use halogens for accent
lighting since CFLs just can't do it. Even when you look at so called
dowlighter replacement they don't have the same emission profile.
The point of using halogens is that they are much more directional than
either incandescent or fluorescent (of all varieties) this makes them
very good for task lighting which is what you need in a kitchen


re LEDs, theyre still gimmick lighting at this time. Maybe one day, but
certainly not today, not for normal household uses.

The kind of lighting the OP is talking about is the first place that
LEDs will break into the market. Take a look at Luxeons latest K2
devices and efficiency is on a par with CFL the issue is just cost. For
broad diffuse lighting LEDs have much further to go as CFLs are pretty
good at this and the emission profile (virtually isotropic from a CFL)
is similar to what we're used to from incandescent. LEDs on the other
hand need lots of optics to create a beam profile that's isotropic
since output is usually lambertian or if a lens is used fairly focused.

Fash


NT

In article ,
Christian McArdle wrote:
Then all those wastrels who insist on needless polluting the environment
just because they whine on about liking inefficient lightbulbs can at
least pay more than proportionally extra for the priviledge of
destroying the planet.

They already do in extra electricity charges.

--
*Isn't it a bit unnerving that doctors call what they do "practice?"

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Thu, 24 Aug 2006 17:36:42 +0100, Andy Hall
wrote:


I'd have to factor in all of my various servers and networking equipment......

There's something that could do with creative regulation, why do PCs
use 50-100W when laptops use 15W (including the screen!).

At the very least there should be energy labelling.

Intel have got a lot to answer for...

cheers,
Pete.

On 2006-08-24 12:53:29 +0100, "Christian McArdle"
said:

Lighting is probably the least of my domestic expenditures of the
electrical flavour. I would say that fridges and freezers run to more
than that.

You would be surprised. When I first swapped all our incandescent bulbs
for CFLs, in about 1996, I measured the electricity usage before and
after. The electricity usage went down to 60% of its previous value.
Therefore, we concluded that lighting was about 50% of our electrical
usage. The gas bill was about the same as the electric, so I suspect,
making a guess that gas provides more CO2 emissions than electricity on
a cost basis), that wasteful lighting was emitting a good sixth of the
house CO2 emissions. If everyone changed, that would be an extremely
substantial benefit.

Not really convinced....



Lighting is probably the least of my domestic expenditures of the
electrical flavour. I would say that fridges and freezers run to more
than that.

And the other 'permanently on' stuff is not insignificant either..PABX,
router, printers, TV head amp, etc...

You should note that our house had no multiple halogen fittings or such
like. Every room was lit by a single incandescent bulb in the middle. A
halogen equiped house is likely to spend well over half the electricity
bill on lighting. A fridge probably only draws about 100W over a
continuous period. Little electronic devices probably only a couple of
watts each. Nothing compared to lightbulbs, which are often
continuously lit throughout the day, especially in winter.

Christian.

I'd have to factor in all of my various servers and networking equipment......

On 2006-08-24 13:01:07 +0100, "Christian McArdle"
said:

It might be if it were unreasonable use of electricity, but it isn't.
Other uses are far more significant.

And should be tackled also. I'm not one to pick and choose. However,
lighting IS a very significant use of CO2. OK, the bulbs don't use as
much as many appliances, but they are on for hours at a time. At least
a third and possibly more than a half of electricty use in a house goes
on lighting when using incandescent bulbs. When people have obscene
halogen room lighting throughout, often in excess of 500W per room,
lighting can absolutely dwarf the other electrical usages. Often these
are the same houses that get so hot in summer from the lighting, that
people insist on installing air conditioning to take away the heat!

The trouble is that the alternatives are not at all attractive.....



There is no need for wasteful lighting as low energy alternatives exist.

But not aesthetically acceptable. Until that happens, these are not
viable alternatives.

Therefore, punitive taxation should be applied for wasteful methods. I
would like to see this principle consistently applied to all energy
usage, where it can be practically applied and where low energy
alternatives exist.

Christian.

There's more than enough taxation already and this would simply promote
a black market in light bulbs or people would pay the money.

Pete C wrote:
On Thu, 24 Aug 2006 17:36:42 +0100, Andy Hall
wrote:

I'd have to factor in all of my various servers and networking equipment......

There's something that could do with creative regulation, why do PCs
use 50-100W when laptops use 15W (including the screen!).

Wel I have just replaced my 17" monitor that was about 50W, with a 19"
LCD which on standby, is about 3W I think. About 30W illuminated..

The PCs - well..it costs money to go for ultra small chips that can
still switch fast enough at lower power. The problem is inherent to
Microsnot..it needs giga flops to even put the welcome screen up, let
alone the bloatware it normally runs.




At the very least there should be energy labelling.

Intel have got a lot to answer for...


No Microsft actually. The typical American response to a design issue
'build it crude and then throw a big engine at it'

cheers,
Pete.

On 2006-08-24 16:54:31 +0100, "Christian McArdle"
said:

The trouble is that the alternatives are not at all attractive.....

They're not that bad. It's not like you have to go with Ikea special
stick bulbs.

The mechanical aspects are bad enough. They are all too large.

My main issue is with the appalling quality of the light produced.


There is no need for wasteful lighting as low energy alternatives exist.

But not aesthetically acceptable. Until that happens, these are not
viable alternatives.

But why should you be allowed to needlessly pollute just because you
prefer the look of older bulbs, which are actually not more attractive
than many CFLs, just slightly different.

If it were as simple as that, then that might be a justification.



There's more than enough taxation already and this would simply promote
a black market in light bulbs or people would pay the money.

The majority would just buy the CFLs.

I think you might be surprised

I can't see lots of people coming back with 20 packs of light bulbs
through the channel tunnel, like they do for ciggies. Particularly as
the alternative will actually save many times their purchase cost in
electricity.

Christian.

On 2006-08-24 17:31:06 +0100, Pete C said:

On Thu, 24 Aug 2006 17:36:42 +0100, Andy Hall
wrote:


I'd have to factor in all of my various servers and networking equipment......

There's something that could do with creative regulation, why do PCs
use 50-100W when laptops use 15W (including the screen!).

At the very least there should be energy labelling.
Intel have got a lot to answer for...

cheers,
Pete.

Different application. Different architecture.

Have you ever visited a major data centre or network point of presence
and seen the electricity supply and cooling arrangements?

David Hansen wrote:
On 23 Aug 2006 16:42:32 -0700 someone who may be
wrote this:-

Well I guess related to a post I made ages ago--incandescent lighting
is not completely inefficient in a heated building--some of the 'waste'
heat is 'recycled' to heat the building.

Only when heating is necessary. Even then it is a very expensive way
of providing heat.

Perhaps not when I was living in France--the whole apartment block had
electric power only (inc. the heaters), and in France electricity is
cheaper--it's one of the biggest producers of nuclear power. So whether
it's the wall heater or waste heat from the lights, it costs the same.
Maybe I'll also clarify: the light is going on my desk--I kinda like
the feel of a tiny halogen lamp in a dark room.

Seb

On Thu, 24 Aug 2006 18:42:54 +0100, Andy Hall
wrote:

On 2006-08-24 17:31:06 +0100, Pete C said:

On Thu, 24 Aug 2006 17:36:42 +0100, Andy Hall
wrote:

I'd have to factor in all of my various servers and networking equipment......

There's something that could do with creative regulation, why do PCs
use 50-100W when laptops use 15W (including the screen!).

At the very least there should be energy labelling.

Different application. Different architecture.

Have you ever visited a major data centre or network point of presence
and seen the electricity supply and cooling arrangements?

Are your servers at home a major data centre or point of prescence?

I meant the sort of PCs bought for home/office use.

cheers,
Pete.

Christian McArdle wrote:

I quite agree with the points you make. But there is one basic problem.
Since there are other reasonable viewpoints as well, is it really a
good idea for one camp to force others to live by its views? If you
vote yes to that, youre voting for others to force their views onto you
too. It cuts both ways. You'd effectively indirectly be voting for part
p and other such crap.

Well, to take a contrary view would require you to agree to anarchy.

not at all, just not heavy handed ott unnecessary and questionable
control. Some things our society has a good level of agreement on, and
are important. Some things are neither. Our society certainly does not
have a concensus in favour of cfls, and their importance is still open
to reasonable debate.


IMHO nannying and dumbifying is the cause of a lot of problems in
British society today.

I don't like the term nannying. It is used by right wingers to scare people
and justify all sorts of crap, like the right to torture animals, blow smoke
in my face and needlessly destroy the planet.

Maybe it is sometimes, but I think its also used fairly enough. Just
how much government control of your life do you want? Where do we draw
the line? Trying to force the populatoin into using a product is has
firmly voted against is just not imho a constructive way to govern. The
constructive path would be to look at why people arent buying many cfls
and address the issues with them. And theres nothing difficult about
doing so.

And in other areas like part p... I dont even need to comment.


NT

On 2006-08-24 16:54:31 +0100, "Christian McArdle"
said:

The trouble is that the alternatives are not at all attractive.....

They're not that bad. It's not like you have to go with Ikea special
stick bulbs.

There is no need for wasteful lighting as low energy alternatives exist.

But not aesthetically acceptable. Until that happens, these are not
viable alternatives.

But why should you be allowed to needlessly pollute just because you
prefer the look of older bulbs, which are actually not more attractive
than many CFLs, just slightly different.


I don't needlessly pollute for two reasons:

- I don't consider that CFLs are an acceptable form of lighting based
on what I expect from artificial lighting.

- I don't control the means of electricity generation (e.g. burning of
fossil fuels and consequent CO2 emission. That is in the hands of the
energy producers, the market for fossil fuels and to some extent the
government.

I don't buy the argument that says that if I reduce my electricity
consumption by some means or other it will reduce CO2 and other
pollutant emissions over the long term; and I don't even buy the one
that says that if everybody does, it will make a big difference.

Realistically, these things don't happen, so it would make far more
sense to focus on different areas:

- Heating is by far the largest use of domestic energy, so it makes
sense to go for the most efficient use of fossil fuel that one can.
That's under my control.

- Transport is almost certainly the second. I can affect that by
working at home when possible.

I don't think that reduction in electricity consumption, taken over
time would act as a means to reduce pollution, rather the reverse.
That will be market and cost driven. An increasing electricity
consumption, as will tend to happen anyway will have the effect of
increasing the demand for fossil fuels, given the present generating
capacity, and hence the cost. This in turn will make nuclear
generation even more attractive than it is today.

OTOH, reducing the rate of increase in electricity requirement would
have the effect of delaying the inevitable and obvious move to nuclear
generation and hence have a far more significant effect on polluting
emissions.

On 2006-08-24 22:14:51 +0100, Pete C said:

On Thu, 24 Aug 2006 18:42:54 +0100, Andy Hall
wrote:

On 2006-08-24 17:31:06 +0100, Pete C said:

On Thu, 24 Aug 2006 17:36:42 +0100, Andy Hall
wrote:

I'd have to factor in all of my various servers and networking equipment......

There's something that could do with creative regulation, why do PCs
use 50-100W when laptops use 15W (including the screen!).

At the very least there should be energy labelling.

Different application. Different architecture.

Have you ever visited a major data centre or network point of presence
and seen the electricity supply and cooling arrangements?

Are your servers at home a major data centre or point of prescence?

Nope, but some of the equipment is the same.



I meant the sort of PCs bought for home/office use.


To do what, though?

Andy Hall wrote:
On 2006-08-24 16:54:31 +0100, "Christian McArdle"
said:

The trouble is that the alternatives are not at all attractive.....

They're not that bad. It's not like you have to go with Ikea special
stick bulbs.

There is no need for wasteful lighting as low energy alternatives
exist.

But not aesthetically acceptable. Until that happens, these are
not viable alternatives.

But why should you be allowed to needlessly pollute just because you
prefer the look of older bulbs, which are actually not more attractive
than many CFLs, just slightly different.


I don't needlessly pollute for two reasons:

- I don't consider that CFLs are an acceptable form of lighting based on
what I expect from artificial lighting.

- I don't control the means of electricity generation (e.g. burning of
fossil fuels and consequent CO2 emission. That is in the hands of the
energy producers, the market for fossil fuels and to some extent the
government.

I don't buy the argument that says that if I reduce my electricity
consumption by some means or other it will reduce CO2 and other
pollutant emissions over the long term; and I don't even buy the one
that says that if everybody does, it will make a big difference.

Realistically, these things don't happen, so it would make far more
sense to focus on different areas:

- Heating is by far the largest use of domestic energy, so it makes
sense to go for the most efficient use of fossil fuel that one can.
That's under my control.

- Transport is almost certainly the second. I can affect that by
working at home when possible.

I don't think that reduction in electricity consumption, taken over time
would act as a means to reduce pollution, rather the reverse. That
will be market and cost driven. An increasing electricity consumption,
as will tend to happen anyway will have the effect of increasing the
demand for fossil fuels, given the present generating capacity, and
hence the cost. This in turn will make nuclear generation even more
attractive than it is today.

OTOH, reducing the rate of increase in electricity requirement would
have the effect of delaying the inevitable and obvious move to nuclear
generation and hence have a far more significant effect on polluting
emissions.



I could not agree more.

CFL's like all the other 'recycling/eco/green' issues in the end turn
out to be more sops to the eco conscience, than actual meaningful solutions.

I am reminded of the huge weight loss I noted years ago in a rather
attractive girl..'what diet did you use?' ' No diet at all' 'so what's
the secret?' ' Just eating less....'

All the excellent switching off of lights and TV's that my wife insist
on was totally negated when I came down this morning and find the room
with the UFH thermostat in it had the window wide open...so the poor UFH
had been heating the countryside since 4 a.m.

Domestic fuel consumption is actually far greater than all the
electricity consumption of fuel put together, and transport exceeds them
both.

The most major area to tackle is transport, and the causes of transport..

e.g. consider, you drive from e.g. Cambridge to London to go to Ikea,
to get our cheap tacky Swedish crap that has been imported from Sweden,
and so on. 120mile round trip, adding say 3 gallons of petrol - maybe
£13.50 - to the cost of the item. Before tyre and brake wear
replacement energies are considered.

Order on line, and save 3 gallons. Thats about 463 MJ of energy.

If that had been burnt in a power station it would probably be around
200 Megajoules of electrical output.

There are 8760 hours in a year. 3 Mega seconds. So thats about 66W

So. *That one trip to London and back equates to a 60W light bulb left
on 24x7 ALL YEAR*.

There's something that could do with creative regulation, why do PCs
use 50-100W when laptops use 15W (including the screen!).

The desktops frequently don't use 50-100W if set up properly with the energy
saving options implemented. Set it to halt the processor on idle, shut off
the screen and power down the disks and it won't eat that much more than a
laptop.

Christian.

Maybe it is sometimes, but I think its also used fairly enough. Just
how much government control of your life do you want? Where do we draw
the line?

You draw the line where behaviour adversely affects others to an
unreasonable degree.

The constructive path would be to look at why people arent buying
many cfls and address the issues with them. And theres nothing difficult
about doing so.

My belief is that the main reason is because of a combination of unit
purchase price disparity and the stupidity of the average purchaser. I don't
believe that people specifically and intentionally buying vanity bulbs is
the main problem. I think that if vanity bulbs were seriously increased in
price, then the majority, who couldn't tell the colour spectrum of a sodium
light from an incandescent, would buy CFLs and those who want to continue
with halogens can pay enough extra to offset the carbon.

And in other areas like part p... I dont even need to comment.

Yes. Part P fails on many counts. It was ill thought out and didn't pass the
test of adversely affecting others. Pure protectionism from vested
interests.

Christian.