Enforce Fluorescence?

A conversation the other day yielded three opinions about the extent to which the government should mandate the use of fluorescent light bulbs and impede the use of incandescent ones.

Let us first consider the facts. These are gathered from gelighting.com, wattwatchers.com, howstuffworks.com, ajdesigner.com, and amazon.com (to validate price estimations), none of which provided meaningfully contradictory information.

Fluorescent bulbs use about one fifth of the energy that incandescent bulbs use, but cost about five times as much. Fluorescent bulbs last up to ten times as long. The ‘Dlog doesn’t have statistics on bulb life, so it grants conservatively that fluorescents last five times as long.

Fluorescents contain mercury – about as much as is found in a ballpoint pen. Fluorescents take a few seconds to light up and emit a qualitatively different light (more about this below). Fluorescents can work with dimmer switches but a special kind of bulb is recommended.

In summary, in the name of energy efficiency the government has a strong motivation to encourage the use of fluorescents. Fluorescents are also plainly more cost effective except that they require a larger up-front cost, so the economic benefit is realized at time scales of months and longer. Fluorescents’ environmental benefits of energy efficiency and waste reduction likely outweigh the mercury cost. There is a small convenience cost to fluorescents from the warmup-time and the dimmer-switch deal.

M began the conversation by asserting that the market should determine what type of light bulb is used, and that the government should do nothing to encourage fluorescents.

Your faithful ‘Dlogger (YFD) countered that the government should do everything within its power to encourage fluorescents, comparing incandescents to lead-bearing paint.

R, ever the voice of either reason or wishy-washiness, suggested the government incentivize the use of fluorescents by increasing taxes on incandescents. He maintained that further action is warranted only for issues of safety (e.g. for lead paint). The conversation then trailed off in the direction of motorcycle helmets.

Who was correct? Should the government do nothing, uses taxes to incentivize, or, to put it simply, ban the use of incandescents? (As YFD is not a constitutional scholar he will intentionally not get into how such a law would be written and/or justified.)

Important, for M’s argument, is the qualitative difference in the type of light emitted by the two bulb types. YFD characterizes the light from fluorescents as whiter and softer than that from incandescents. As to which one he prefers, it’s a close call. YFD’s bedside table has a lamp with a fluorescent bulb which YFD’s wife calls the “lizard lamp,” implying it looks like it belongs in an aquarium. Fluorescent light is aesthetically not for everybody, and that’s important in a free country. To some extent, if a consumer wants to spend extra money on the warm crisp light of an incandescent, he should be free to do so.

Of course, a smoker’s freedom ends where a non-smoker’s lungs begin. Thus no smoking on airplanes and, in light of overwhelming climate change evidence, no incandescent bulbs. And that consumers quibble about lizard light or the Chevy Bolt’s weak acceleration when our energy security and ultimately the fate of the planet is at stake is a source of unending frustration to YFD. Nonetheless, it’s a free country, and Americans are thus at an impasse. R’s pisswarm approach wins the day.

A final note though: the economic argument for fluorescents is all but unassailable. Nobody who doesn’t snap his fingers to stream-of-consciousness poetry would really miss incandescent light. If such light bulbs still sell, it is because people can’t do basic budgeting on anything past a scale of months. It is a fool who puts his faith in such an irrational animal as the free market to produce desirable outcomes.