Tuesday 17 April 2007

Stocking up on Light Bulbs

The Australian federal government announced recently that they were going to ban the sale of incandescent light globes from next year, so that everyone switches to the new, energy efficient compact fluorescent ones. Supposedly they are much cheaper to run and their higher initial cost is less than the equivalent number of incandescent globes that would burn out during their lifetime. This sounds like a win-win with the emission of greenhouse gases being reduced while the consumer actually saves money in the long run.

I'll use the new fluorescents as much as possible (I already have half a dozen scattered through our house), but I think I'll also put in a stockpile of incandescent globes in the garage before they're no longer on sale. Why?
- unused, an incandescent globe should have an almost unlimited shelf life, and it's cheaper to have some of these sitting around as spares than the more expensive fluorescent globes.
- I have a mix of screw thread and bayonet light fittings in the house. I've only seen compact fluorescent globes with the modern bayonet fitting, and it may be difficult or impossible to get them with screw fittings. I'd rather not have to replace light fittings just to be able change light globes.
- I can cobble together a generator from some wire and an old bike - so in a disaster I could always get lighting setup using incandescent globes. Doing the same with compact fluorescents would be much harder as they don't work with DC and need 240V (as far as I know).

Enough Wealth

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