“At 131 years old, Thomas Edison’s bright idea may be due for a makeover,” said NBC’s Chief Environmental Affairs Correspondent Anne Thompson, “but the government-mandated transition from the incandescent to the compact fluorescent – the CFL – isn’t winning many style points.”
“That’s not true,” I hollered at the TV, sending my cat flying off the sofa. You would think I was watching the Superbowl instead of the nightly news by the way I was shouting at my flatscreen.
It’s really not true! The federally-mandated phase out of inefficient incandescent light bulbs does not in any way specify that consumers must only buy mercury-laden CFLs. The new energy efficiency standards, set to start in 2012, say we can replace our energy-wasting incandescent bulbs with any lighting technology that is roughly 30 percent more efficient than traditional incandescent light bulbs.
That means we could light our homes and businesses with CFLs, but it also means we can choose energy-efficient LED lighting. It even means we could turn to slightly more efficient incandescents that use halogen technology (although this borderline defeats the purpose of the standards, since halogens just barely make the energy-efficiency cut).
Disappointingly, last night’s NBC Nightly News story didn’t even mention LEDs. Although, if you visit the show’s website, you’ll see a clip that never made it on-air showing LED lighting as an option. But even that clip contained misinformation, because it wrongly stated that LEDs and CFLs are both 75 percent more efficient than incandescent lighting. Cree LED lights, like the CR6 LED downlight, are nearly 85 percent more efficient than incandescent lighting. And while 10 percent might not seem like much, if you have 10 to 20 downlights—or more—it adds up!
Unfortunately, as we draw closer to the first step of the incandescent phase out, which begins in 2012, more misinformation about the energy efficiency standards will probably penetrate the media. It doesn’t help that Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) is leading an effort to repeal the energy-efficiency standards. Supporters of reversing the phase out say the government shouldn’t mandate what type of lights we can use. They also say the incandescent phase out is costing the U.S. jobs after recent closings of traditional light bulb factories.
But what naysayers don’t mention is that we’ve created jobs by investing in new technologies, not old wasteful ones. So while incandescents and CFLs are almost entirely made outside the U.S., Cree was adding jobs and expanding manufacturing in North Carolina. In fact, we’ve added nearly 2,000 U.S. jobs focused on energy-efficient lighting in the past 10 years.
In September, we announced at a press conference that Cree has added more than 600 jobs since early 2009, surpassing our 2012 hiring goals set in fall 2009.
Also, this is not about the government mandating what we can and cannot consume. It is about setting national efficiency standards that save money for energy users, protect customers from out-of-date technologies that are overly expensive to operate, boost innovation and protect the environment.
On the Bright Side
Fortunately, it appears that most Americans are down with making the switch to energy-efficient lighting. A new USA TODAY/Gallup poll reports that nearly three out of four U.S. adults – or 71 percent –say they have replaced traditional light bulbs in their home in recent years with CFLs or LEDs. Additionally, 84 percent say they’re “very satisfied” or “satisfied” with the alternatives, according to the survey of 1,016 U.S. adults taken Feb. 15 to 16.
Many businesses, cities and universities are taking the lead on switching to energy-efficient LED lighting. You can see some of these LED lighting revolutionaries here.
For a complete rundown on what the new energy-efficiency standards mean for lighting, I highly recommend you read this informative, easy-to-understand document from the National Resources Defense Council. That way, I won’t be the only one yelling at the TV (or newspaper or computer or radio or mobile device) the next time a misleading news about the phase out is reported.
- http://www.creeledrevolution.com/blog/2011/02/22/the-incandescent-light-bulb-phase-out-does-not-mandate-cfls-as-a-replacement/
