The downside of the Green Movement

[Kenneth R.]

Way to be.

Penguin, ask them what they do with the ballasts. I'm genuinely interested.

[Chrisf]

Err, I don't care what they do with the ballasts...? Should I? The mercury is the real hazard, and they probably do ship them off to a factory for reuse, since it's generally much cheaper to take something highly processed like mercury in an already pure form than to extract it from nature from scratch.

Someone went to the hospital from a broken CF bulb? Why? The amount per bulb is about equal to this ======> .

Yeah, that one dot. Unless they drank it directly, I can't believe they would have any noticeable effects. Of course you don't want to have ANY unneeded mercury in you, so if you do break one, vent the place by opening a window for an hour, and pick up the broken pieces but don't use a vacuum. And that's it. The media horror stories are a joke, and probably so is the part about someone needing to go to the hospital.


I have CF's throughout the house. There's no flicker, there's no TV or stereo interference, and it has no effect on my wireless network.

I can only conclude that most of the so-called negatives that people are talking about here are pure ignorance.

I'm willing to be proven wrong, but I've yet to see anything to see anything to back these claims up...

[Kenneth R.]

A CFL broke in the room and even after they cleaned it up, a kid had to go to the hospital for mercury poisoning. I can link you the story if you care. They might have been dumb enough not to open the windows, but then, should that really be a requirement for lighting? The ballasts aren't recycleable so I don't see how that makes them so ecofriendly. Really, the only advantage of CFLs are the supposed longer life and the lower electricity usage. But as far as actual environmental impact, they're a disaster waiting to happen. If you require me to cite sources I will, I just thought that by presenting the situation the rest would follow by common sense.

I won't stop you from using and liking CFLs, (how could I anyway?) but I certainly won't use them and I'd like people to know what they're getting into, both positively and negatively, and that's why I started this thread.

[freakchylde]

Originally Posted by kashford

Also, there is a proposed bilateral/multilateral trade agreement with the Americas that is being pushed but little to no action on it has really been taken. Besides the EU, the US subsidizes its farmers to an outrageous extent still because they have massive lobbying groups in D.C.

Yeah, vaguely mentioned that. Subsidies are fine and dandy, if there's an overabundance, but we've subsidied ourselves out of a food supply. And I don't see that changing, anytime soon.

[Chrisf]

Originally Posted by Kenneth R.

A CFL broke in the room and even after they cleaned it up, a kid had to go to the hospital for mercury poisoning. I can link you the story if you care. They might have been dumb enough not to open the windows, but then, should that really be a requirement for lighting? The ballasts aren't recycleable so I don't see how that makes them so ecofriendly. Really, the only advantage of CFLs are the supposed longer life and the lower electricity usage. But as far as actual environmental impact, they're a disaster waiting to happen. If you require me to cite sources I will, I just thought that by presenting the situation the rest would follow by common sense.

I'd like to see the story. I have a feeling there's more to it than just that they broke a bulb. You'd have heard 100 stories all over the place by this point if that were the case.

The reason that CF's are considered eco-friendly is because they use 75% less electricity for the same result. The amount of mercury going into the environment is vastly less than if you took every CF bulb, used it for its entire lifespan, then broke it open and release the mercury directly into the environment. Most people seem to have no concept of how bad burning coal is...

[Diamond45]

If you could recycle the ballasts - or better yet - just use the same ballast over and over and just replace the bulb - then I'd give more creedence towards the CFLs. Until then - they're just as bad as regular incandescent bulbs.

[Kenneth R.]

Originally Posted by Chrisf

I'd like to see the story. I have a feeling there's more to it than just that they broke a bulb. You'd have heard 100 stories all over the place by this point if that were the case.

The reason that CF's are considered eco-friendly is because they use 75% less electricity for the same result. The amount of mercury going into the environment is vastly less than if you took every CF bulb, used it for its entire lifespan, then broke it open and release the mercury directly into the environment. Most people seem to have no concept of how bad burning coal is...

Well my man, the sad fact is although I agree that coal is not a solution, if they don't use it on lighting, they'll find some other way to waste it on something else. Pessimistic perhaps, but true. It's not going to lighten the load by switching to CFL

[Chrisf]

Originally Posted by Kenneth R.

Well my man, the sad fact is although I agree that coal is not a solution, if they don't use it on lighting, they'll find some other way to waste it on something else. Pessimistic perhaps, but true. It's not going to lighten the load by switching to CFL

What do you think they'll use it for? To put in stockings of the bad children at Chrisfmas?

Seriously, that's a hands-up-in-the-air kinda argument. There's nothing we can do, so why bother? I happen to believe that most problems can be solved or prevented. In this case, you have a clear way to lower a substantial part of your electric bill and make your house a little cooler in the summer. Someone else might be consuming more coal for some purpose, but in order to say there's no benefit to me using CF bulbs, you'd have to show that they're doing simply because I'm using less. Doesn't make much sense to me.

And I don't get the concern over ballasts. They're tiny. Is there some concern we're going to have landfills overflowing with these things? Really, with all the other stuff we waste, why the big concern about such a tiny thing?

And I'd like to see the link about someone needing to be hospitalized for mercury poisoning from a broken bulb. It sounds suspiciously like FUD to me, but I'll give some benefit of the doubt until I can read further.

[Kenneth R.]

Tunnessen WW Jr, McMahon KJ, Baser M (1987). "Acrodynia: exposure to mercury from fluorescent light bulbs". Pediatrics 79 (5): 786–9. PMID 3575038.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3575038
The diagnosis was mercury poisoning, and an investigation of his environment disclosed that he had been exposed to mercury from broken fluorescent light bulbs.

Wikipedia. Not cited. But you know what? All of the terms used are cited, and this really isn't research so much as the implications of technology as fact.
Quality of light: A phosphor emits light in a narrow frequency range, unlike an incandescent filament, which emits the full spectrum, though not all colors equally, of visible light. A mix of phosphors gives a good approximation of daylight or incandescent light can be reached. However, every extra phosphor added to the coating mix causes a loss of efficiency and increased cost. Good quality consumer CFLs use three or four phosphors to achieve a 'white' light with a Color Rendering Index (CRI) of around 80, where 100 represents the appearance of colors under daylight or a blackbody (depending on the correlated color temperature). Incandescent bulbs typically rate higher.

CPSC, Teng Fei Trading Inc. Announce Recall of Energy Saving Light Bulbs. U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission press release.
http://www.cpsc.gov/CPSCPUB/PREREL/prhtml05/05005.html
Hazard: The base of the bulb is not flame-retardant, as required in the voluntary standard for this type of bulb. Electrical components in the bulb can overheat, posing a fire hazard.

Can CFLs interfere with electronic equipment? at ConsumerReports.org.
http://blogs.consumerreports.org/hom...-problems.html
Most modern TVs, radios, cell phones, and remote controls rely on infrared light to send signals. It’s not common, but some electronic devices mistakenly interpret the infrared light emitted by CFLs as a signal, causing them to temporarily go kerflooey. [...] Our advice is that your friend not use CFLs in fixtures near her TVs, radios, remote controls, or cell phones. If interference occurs, she should move the CFLs away from the electronic equipment or plug the light fixture and the electronic device in different outlets.

Mercury - spills, disposal and site cleanup - what to do if a fluorescent light bulb breaks. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (2007-10-25).
http://www.epa.gov/mercury/spills/index.htm#flourescent
[No quote, just commentary: wow, what a chore.]

Accommodation and Compliance Series: Employees with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
http://www.jan.wvu.edu/media/cfs.html
Migraine Headaches:
Provide task lighting
Eliminate fluorescent lighting

Working with Light Sensitivity
http://www.jan.wvu.edu/cgi-win/OrgQuery.exe?Sol400
Individuals who experience eye strain or fatigue may benefit from natural light. If it is not possible to situate the worker near a natural light source, alternative lighting may be an accommodation solution. Full Spectrum Lighting or Full Spectrum Light Filters (for covering fluorescent lighting) may reduce glare from overhead lights by simulating a natural light source and blocking ultraviolet rays.

Accommodation Ideas for Employees with Epilepsy.
http://www.jan.wvu.edu/media/epilepsy.html
Alternative Lighting: If the employee has photosensitivity epilepsy, or other sensitivity to light, s/he may experience seizures or headaches due to fluorescent lights or flickers from other lighting sources.
Replace fluorescent lights with full spectrum lighting
Turn off fluorescent lights

I could go on and on. You just don't have these problems with the good old incandescent bulb. It just uses more energy. Well, I'll take it.

[Pellaz]

BTW, I didn't realize how disruptive large-scale LED lights were for EM until today, when I was listening to AM radio at a traffic light with LED walk/don't walk signals. There was a LOT of interference and static when the LED "don't walk" array was blinking, reallly thick.