A Bright Idea

But not bright enough. I'm talking of course about the darling of the latest incarnation of the environmental movement: the curlicue light bulb, or Compact Flourescent (CFL) bulb.

Don't misunderstand - I'm all for the saving of electricity, and therefore energy (and, for that matter, money - hey I'm a good American capitalist!) They last longer, meaning I have to buy fewer and think about them less frequently. They're tougher, meaning I won't be bringing home a 4-pack with only one viable bulb anymore, and I don't have to nurse my paranoia that the bulb will shatter in my hand as I'm installing it, hopelessly shredding my poor fingertips to ribbons and I won't be able to write for weeks and weeks! Oh the humanity!! Yes, I actually worry about this when I'm installing a standard bulb. Hey, I warned you I was neurotic.

But the technology has a long way to go before it's ready for prime-time.

I went ahead and bought a CFL to replace the burnt out bulb in the torchiere lamp in my bedroom. I bought the CFL bulb that the package said was equivalent to my original 60W incandescent bulb. Feeling very self-satisifed and ready to transfer all our incandescents over to these nice new efficient bulbs, I screwed it into the socket and triumphantly flipped the switch.

Ha HA! Take THAT, you electricity wasting, filament busting, super-fragile incandescents!

Nothing happened. And then the light sort of came on. I say "sort of" because the light was very dim. Over the course of the next couple of minutes, the light grew to a stable luminosity, but it was still less than the 60W incandescent, and it was still that cold gray of flourescent lighting rather than the warm yellow of standard bulbs. I was not pleased.

I did some research for this post on the GE website.

The bottom line is, despite the assertions of GE and other lighting manufacturers, CFLs just are not yet as good as the old inefficient incandescents, and here's why:


1) CFL light takes a while to warm up to its full brightness. When I flip a switch, I expect the output to be 100%, or else something's wrong with the bulb. This appears to just be a failure of the current technology. Hopefully the manufacturers will be able to improve this factor over time.

2) The light is dimmer and colder than standard bulbs. GE says that you can get around this by using a higher wattage equivalent: "Because the wattage of a CFL bulb is much lower than that of an incandescent, you can use higher wattage CFL giving you the equivalent light of a higher wattage incandescent. For example: If your fixture says not to exceed 60 watts, you can use a 15 watt CFL to get the same amount of light as an incandescent bulb or use up to a 42 watt CFL and increase the amount of light." But the box for 60W-equivalent says to buy a 15W CFL to get the same amount of light. So why should it occur to me to buy a 42W CFL? So this needs to be clarified on the packaging for one, and it still doesn't do anything about the coldness and grayness (is that a word?) of the output light. So, GE et al, include the brightness info on the packaging (or make it more obvious if it's already there because I don't recall seeing it!), and work on the tone of the lighting.

3) Lack of (or lack of availability of) bulbs for dimmable or multi-way lights. Again, GE says they have a 12/23/29 CFL bulb to compare to the 50/100/150 3-way standard bulbs, and dimmable 26W CFL to compare to the dimmable 100W standard bulb. I say that Target isn't stocking them! So this is a problem of both the manufacturers and of Target. As a retailer, you'd think Target would be stocking the big trend all over creation. They've certainly got enough of the ugly trendy fashions in their clothing departments (foreshadowing for an upcoming post, btw), but they've only got one or two types of CFL bulbs available. I cry foul. I am not about to go to a home improvement store for light bulbs - yes, mainly because I'm lazy - but also on principle. And Manufacturers - push the idea on the retailers. Going green is the big thing lately. Help them help you help us (think about it - it makes sense.)

So that is my big beef with the CFL. I want to use them, I'd like to use them, I like where things are going by the mere fact that they exist, but they just simply do not compare with incandescents just yet.

CFL Manufacturers, I challenge you to work on the technology, work on the quality, and work on the availability. When those three things come together, you'll be unstoppable. In the meantime, good job on moving toward a better alternative.

And don't hate when I buy another batch of incandescents.