CFL Health Risks
Why is there no mention in the article about the possiblity that these lights can cause migraines, especially for people with epilepsy or other light sensetive conditions and the lights have also been suggested to aggrivate certain skin conditions, going so far as suggesting they incrase chances of skin cancer. Considering countries like the UK want to make these lights mandatory, it is raises possible problems for millions of people.
http://spectrumalliance.org.uk/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7167860.stm
The reason there is no mention of health risks is because the health risks you describe are ridiculous and unsubstantiated. It goes along the nonsense of claiming that fluoride in drinking water is a danger because it's "forced" onto us. (Tonycom (talk) 00:07, 21 March 2008 (UTC))
I disagree, ordinary CFLs tend to be pulsed with 50-100 Hz and thus can indice head related side effects like headache, nausea etc.. Certain skin conditions can maybe be affected, but for that I would like see substantial references. And yes flouride is poisinous, but it also strongly depend on the dosage. So brushing your teeth won't kill you :-) The strongest argument against CFLs as the only means of lights is:
- Bears a significant manufacture and destruction cost.
- Hard to properly recycle.
- Contains hazardous mercury.
- Very innefficient compared to fluorescent lamps with separated ballast.
Ordinary lamps are easy to recycle, and can be done so efficiently. So the CFLs as a means to accomplish a better enviroment doesn't cut it. Also to keep the price of the ballast down, many CFL manufacturers have cut corners in regard to component quality with significant risk of fire as result. Electron9 (talk) 00:43, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
More on the health risks of CFLs
Below you can find an email that was sent to the Europarliamentarians of the Committee for Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, the Committee for Internal Market and Consumer Protection and the Committee for Climate Change:
- Email sent to European Parliamentarians: About the negative health effects of low energy light bulbs / CFLs
I request all editors to research and write up an appropriate section on "Health Risks attributed to CFLs" too, when you all have time.
Thanks
Atulsnischal (talk) 19:43, 3 May 2008 (UTC)
CFL energy consumption compared to incandescent bulbs
This section in the main article needs to be edited by someone who has a degree in engineering, becuase what is currently up there is mathematically incorrect.
The equations below are wrong because they are not taking the poor "POWER-FACTOR" (PF) of CFLs into account. PF is a technical term. It is a measure of active power vs reactive power for an electricla appliance. CFLs have a power factor of 0.6 at best. Incandencent bulbs have a PF of 1.
This means that a CLF rated at 20W infact consumes:
20W/0.6 pf = approx 33 Watts.Power Factor = Cos (theta) where theta is tha phase lag between Voltage and Current. Power consumed = Rated Power/PF
Forgive me for pointing this out if it's been covered above somewhere (I only skimmed most of this talk page), but the article's discussion over energy consumption seems to use two different sets of figures. From the article:CFLs use about a quarter of the power of incandescent bulbs. For example, a 15-watt CFL produces the same amount of light as a 60-watt incandescent bulb (approximately 900 lumens or 60 lumens per watt). A comparison of the purchase and operating costs of these two light sources follows. The kilowatt-hour (kWh) is the unit used to sell electrical energy in most countries. The cost of electricity in the United States ranges from $0.06 to $0.38 per kWh, with an average cost in May 2006 of $0.106 per kWh (also see Electricity rates.) For convenience, a rate of $0.10 per kWh is often used for estimating the running costs of appliances.
The CFL, therefore, will save $36.00 in electricity (compared to the incandescent bulb) during its rated life. Some American discount stores sell packages of CFLs for about $2.75 per CFL and incandescent bulbs for about $0.50 each, a $2.25 difference. The estimated payback period for buying the CFL instead of the incandescent bulb is, therefore, 500 hours, which is 100 days at 5 hours per evening.Note: These bulbs are often available for $1 for 60w equivalent bulbs. You will often find CFL haters using wildly inflated prices like $10 a bulb
The text says 60W vs 15W; the equation uses 75W vs 20W. Likewise, the text says the average cost of electricity is $0.10/kWh, but the equation uses $0.08. I don't know enough about all of this to say which explanation is better, but it's clearly inconsistent. Esrever 17:48, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
The table giving light output of Incandescent lamps is way off. Even standard 1000hr 240V frosted lamps used in the UK do better than the figures listed there. The 120V 750hr and 1000hr frosted lamps used in the US are going to be significantly better than even UK 1000hr 240V lamps. (120V filament lamps are more efficient than 240V filament lamps in this power range, and 750hr lamps are more efficient than 1000hr lamps.) To be meaningful, the table needs to consider 120V filament lamps separately from 220/240V filament lamps in any case because of the significant difference in their efficiencies.
Andrew Gabriel, 81.187.162.107 17:00, 25 March 2007 (UTC)Having made the above comment, I set about thinking how to correct that table, and decided it wasn't possible, given the descrete lumen figures down the left hand side. What's really needed is a graph, so I knocked one up giving lumens verses Watts for the different lamp ranges. I ignored the incandescent figures in the table as they're wrong, and used Philips figures for standard UK frosted 1000hr GLS (A-line) lamps. I used the table's figures for the CFL's, as I haven't bothered to get better ones, but the kink in the line puts them under question too. For US A-line lamps, I used figures for 1000hr 120V lamps available in the UK, but that only encompasses 60W and 100W, and these might not match common US values. So if someone can dig out all the US 120V values, I'll add them too. I'm not sure if US commonly uses 1000hr or 750hr lamps—be clear and consistent in which data you provide as they;ll be significantly different.
Graph here removed and superceeded by graph below, 28 March 2007
Sorry, the graph source isn't pretty. This is my first time using the tool, and I couldn't work out how to do a number of things I wanted to (in particular, calculations in the coordinate positionings to get the scale and offsets applied without resorting to magic numbers everywhere).
Andrew Gabriel, 81.187.162.107 20:39, 25 March 2007 (UTC)I note that the discussion is about energy costs and total costs-two different things. When discussing the cost of use, the fact that the incandescent needs to be replaced 7 or so times should enter into the calculations. This appears to have been neglected and may make the high initial cost of CFLs less relevant.Joshua2000 21:15, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
OK, here's the graph with US 750h and 1000h lamps added, data taken from GE's website.
What do people think about replacing the table with this (or something based on it at least)?Interestingly, this clearly shows the 4:1 power ratio of 240V incandescent verses CFL, which is what I've been telling people to use for years, and ignore equivalent power specified on the packaging. It looks like a 3:1 ratio is applicable for 120V lamps.
Andrew Gabriel, 81.187.162.107 19:19, 28 March 2007 (UTC)I decided that I should not rely on the original table for the CFL light output, given all the other data in that table was wrong. I have replaced it in the graph above with data from Philips web page relating to their PL-Electronic CFL's. This data does look more credible—there is no kink in the line for starters which is a good sign. Also, the light output was slightly higher than the original figures—that could be because the original figures were dated.
Andrew Gabriel, 81.187.162.107 07:47, 31 March 2007 (UTC)Confession: I'm the one who keeps truncating this section, including the above formula-with-pictures. Here's why: the only actual information you're conveying is that, for a given lumen-output, the CFL uses x% of the energy. Anything beyond that, and you're turning this article into cheerleading. There's nothing wrong with providing the positive information about CFLs, but please, avoid "dumbing it down" to embellish simple facts. Wikipedia should provide facts, not make the case for you. And if you're going to include financial comparisons, I see nothing wrong with saying that it "pays back" its initial cost much faster than the prevailing rate of return, but it needs to make clear that this is because you're using a light source a lot of people don't like. For example, how would Wikipedia explain the financial advantages of eating only gruel? Use the same kind of comparison. MrVoluntarist 15:01, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
In general the table is original research as a synthesis of data. It produces values intermediate between those provided by a manufacturer. If it showed only data points rather than the smooth curves it would be acceptable. A table would be the best presentation to avoid original research. The watts definitely should be a
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