Comments on: GE's Redesigns Energy-Efficient Bulbs To Look Like Regular Bulbs

By: JR

JR — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 15:04:23 +0000

It’s not as nutty as you make it sound. I’ve been buying the twisty kind of CFL for year (maybe 10 years — have they existed that long), but never made the total switchover because I have a few lamps, including one I inherited from my grandmother, that require an incandescent shaped bulb. So…now I can finally buy CFLs for those lamps as well.

By: Anon

Anon — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 14:13:40 +0000

Yes, high wattage screw in CFLs have existed for some time now:

http://www.goodmart.com/pdfs/tcp/289hi_watt.pdf

The 28968 is equal to a 300W incandescent. I have them in my garage.

The only reason incandescents of this output level don’t exist is due to the heat they would generate and the power they would consume. Fire hazard and possible overload hazard for older homes.

By: Jesse Kopelman

Jesse Kopelman — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 20:50:04 +0000

100W version, really? Wouldn't that be equivalent to a 300+W incandescent, something that never even remotely existed as a traditional bulb?

By: sd

sd — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:19:06 +0000

"So how do you get regular Joes to buy up the greener bulbs (other than stressing that they lower electricity bill costs)? Make them look a lot more like traditional incandescent bulbs — because let’s face it, people don’t like change."

Perhaps I should bow to the wiser marketing people at companies like GE and Philips. But maybe the problem isn't so much that "people don't like change" as much as the lamps in which people would put these bulbs are hostile to anything but the traditional bulb shape.

Some lamp shades have a framework that rests directly on the round top of the bulb. Guess what no longer rests on a "twisty" CFL? Some lamp shades rest on harps which are not big enough to accommodate a CFL of equivalent light output (put a 60-watt incandescent next to a 15-watt twisty CFL and you'll see what I mean). Some lamps are enclosed, which, earlier on, was a no-no for CFLs.

I won't even get to the problem of not being able to dim CFLs if you screw them into a typical incandescent-lamp dimmer circuit. Or the quality of the light, especially of cheaper CFLs.

Yes, there is a percentage of the U.S. populace that approaches anything new with revulsion. But there are others among us who have figured out that it's not "green" to use a CFL if it means you have to buy a light fixture to use it.