Project Porchlight

December 6, 2005 3:12 PM

Project Porchlight [via mefi projects] is a volunteer-based, not-for-profit group that aims to deliver one free energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulb to every household in Canada. If successful, the resulting reduction in pollution from energy saved will be the equivalent of taking 66,000 cars off the road.
posted by Robot Johnny (26 comments total)

If successful, the resulting reduction in pollution from energy saved will be the equivalent of taking 66,000 cars off the road.

What if I live in BC and all my electricity is clean hydroelectric?
posted by Keith Talent at 3:24 PM on December 6, 2005

And, indeed, what about the fact that CFLs stop working when it gets cold out in the porch? At sub-zero, they're useless.
posted by five fresh fish at 3:30 PM on December 6, 2005

What if I live in BC and all my electricity is clean hydroelectric?

Well, if everyone in BC installed the CF bulb they are sent, energy consumption of the province would go down, and you could sell your clean excess electricity over the grid to a polluting neighbor.

And, indeed, what about the fact that CFLs stop working when it gets cold out in the porch? At sub-zero, they're useless.

WTF? They are only sending you one bulb! You can put it inside your house, where presumably it is always above zero..

I thought this was a cool project. These complaints are just ridiculous.
posted by rajbot at 3:46 PM on December 6, 2005

clean hydroelectric?

Hydroelectric is not clean -- the methane generated by the rotting vegetation flooded out is substantial.

Plus, what rajbot said.
posted by docgonzo at 3:58 PM on December 6, 2005

> ) I've heard I can't use this bulb outside in the deep cold, and that it doesn't work in dimmers.

The bulb we are handing out works fine outside in all conditions. Harsh weather is hard on everything, so while it's not ideal to use a CF bulb outside, it should perform well. Sorry, though, CFs should not be used in dimmers. If you have one in your porch light, we regret the inconvenience.

I use CFLs in our porch lights -- I like to use them for everything a) hard to reach/change, b) on for extended periods, c) not used for reading/working -- and they work fine in a Wisconsin winter. We don't usually get below 0°F, though.
posted by dhartung at 4:00 PM on December 6, 2005

I'm using them right now!
posted by Eideteker at 4:05 PM on December 6, 2005

but... it's winter. Bad timing. This time of year, lights inside the house might as well be as inefficient as possible, to contribute to keeping it above zero. I'm hoping to switch to LED lighting eventually. Maybe in the spring.
posted by sfenders at 4:06 PM on December 6, 2005

they work fine in a Wisconsin winter. We don't usually get below 0°F, though.

Ah, well us Canucks usually tell temperature not using Fahrenheit, but Celsius.
posted by Robot Johnny at 4:11 PM on December 6, 2005

...my point being that it's well below zero already!
posted by Robot Johnny at 4:12 PM on December 6, 2005

Out here in BC, BC Hydro has already been encouraging people to switch to compact fluorescents by sending out vouchers for two free CFL lightbulbs per household.

For anyone with a halogen torchiere lamp, there's now CF torchieres available. (BC Hydro keeps telling us about them in the little brochures that come with our monthly power bill.) We switched recently: from 300W down to 60W.
posted by russilwvong at 4:29 PM on December 6, 2005

I use them at home, but I'm curious: CF bulbs almost certainly contain Hg vapors. Does anyone know much about the environmental impact manufacturing process?
posted by JMOZ at 4:31 PM on December 6, 2005

At sub-zero, they're useless.

Right now in Edmonton it's -20 °C (-4 °F) and the two CFLs on the front of my garage are burning cheerily away. Hasn't been down to -30 °C (-22 °F) yet this year, but last year they were fine. Takes a few minutes for them to warm up at these temperatures, so I wouldn't use them if you need lots of light right away (e.g. hooked to a motion sensor).
posted by hangashore at 5:27 PM on December 6, 2005

I have to agree with hangashore,
We've had CFL's on our front porch in Calgary for ~3 years (the same bulbs, they keep going and going..). They work great down to about -30 °C (-22 °F), beyond that they go a funky orange color but still work.
posted by Pink Fuzzy Bunny at 5:46 PM on December 6, 2005

Does anyone know much about the environmental impact manufacturing process?

Here's what bulb-maker
Sylvania has to say about mercury emissions. They quote data for the ubiquitous 4-ft. fluorescent tubes, and point out that the amount of Hg used in manufacture is dwarfed by the amount released by power plants in the combustion of fossil fuels (particularly coal).

To address your question about how much is released to the environment during their manufacture, here's what they say therein:

Even when lamps are manufactured, mercury is contained by manufacturing processes or captured by filters. This leaves only one opportunity for direct mercury release from lamps into the air—breakage at the end of the lamp’s life.

That stage (manufacturing) would probably be the easiest during which to control Hg output. I'd be more concerned about what happens when they burn out - most would be chucked into the trash (but that's already happening with the conventional long tubes anyway [shudder]).
posted by hangashore at 5:54 PM on December 6, 2005

Cool idea. I'd have to put in in the closet as a sparebecause all my Type A non dimming lights are already CFL but I'm sure I'll have to change one sometime.

five fresh fish writes "indeed, what about the fact that CFLs stop working when it gets cold out in the porch? At sub-zero, they're useless."

-25 here today, my outside CFLs are functioning just fine. In fact even the four two tube, 4', $15, electronic ballast, Walmart specials in my garage are firing right up.
posted by Mitheral at 6:14 PM on December 6, 2005

sfenders: but... it's winter. Bad timing. This time of year, lights inside the house might as well be as inefficient as possible, to contribute to keeping it above zero.

That's an interesting thought - if you save, say, 1000 KWH of electricity by not using a regular incandescent bulb inside (which generates heat), you presumably use that much more electric/natural gas/oil/nuclear power heating your house instead. So: are you really ahead for using a low energy bulb indoors in winter?

One argument is that the energy you use in heating your house is cleaner or cheaper than the energy you use to light your house. But it probably depends on where your elecricity and power come from. In my case, gas is still way cheaper than electricity, even though much of my electric is derived from burning natural gas.

Of course, outdoor lighting is a different issue, since all you're doing is "heating the out of doors" with the wasted energy that an incandescent bulb converts to heat instead of light.
posted by drmarcj at 6:21 PM on December 6, 2005

Heh. "I'm Paul Martin, and I approve of this curly thingamajig."
posted by hangashore at 6:57 PM on December 6, 2005

I must have lousy CFLs in my shop, then, because it's hovering somewhere around 5 degrees and they take several minutes to put out enough light to see by, and never reach full brightness.

Also, it's right nippy out there at about -5, and I think the outdoors could use with some good ol' inefficient incandescent heating. Brrrr.
posted by five fresh fish at 7:13 PM on December 6, 2005

Also, I love Canadian politics. Is there another country where the PM would hold up a lightbulb with a cheezy grin on his face? It's good that our politicians mostly don't take themselves too seriously.
posted by five fresh fish at 7:15 PM on December 6, 2005

Not to derail, and perhaps this belongs better on the green, but where in the world can I find a CFL that's actually bright enough to replace incandescent? I spent a whole year with every lamp in the house fitted with 25W CFLs (IKEA brand), and finally gave up in disgust and switched back to incandescent when I got tired of living in the dark.
posted by dmd at 8:05 PM on December 6, 2005

Also, I love Canadian politics. Is there another country where the PM would hold up a lightbulb with a cheezy grin on his face?

...or go out for burgers with a TV host.
posted by Robot Johnny at 9:14 PM on December 6, 2005

One argument is that the energy you use in heating your house is cleaner or cheaper than the energy you use to light your house. But it probably depends on where your elecricity and power come from. In my case, gas is still way cheaper than electricity, even though much of my electric is derived from burning natural gas.

It's not just a matter of cheaper, it's also a matter of efficiency. Pushing electric power out to consumers is high entropy. Gas is presumably less so. I also presume that your furnace is designed to move that heat about in a more practical and efficient way than your bedside lamp.
posted by phearlez at 9:34 PM on December 6, 2005

So: are you really ahead for using a low energy bulb indoors in winter?

Assuming your power comes from fossil fuels and you're heating with gas or oil, yes.

Here's the math for my setup (forced-air natural gas heat):
A 100W incandescent bulb puts out about 330 BTU/hr. According to Wikipedia, (yeah, I know...) fossil fuel powerplant efficiency is in the 30-50% range, so it takes 700-1100 BTU/hr (neglecting transmission losses) to run that bulb.

My 110,000 BTU/hr gas furnace claims 80% efficiency and it's a piece of junk;* the best units get over 95%. Its delivery fan consumes about 1100 Watts. At the same 30-50% powerplant efficiency that's an overall efficiency of 72 to 75%. It only takes 440 to 460 BTU/hr to make up for that light bulb.

The numbers would have been slightly worse for my old oil-fired forced air system; even though it had about the same fuel efficiency the burner took another 2A to run. I suspect they'd be better for a baseboard hot water system as a circulator pump would consume about 1A vs. the 10A my delivery fan pulls.

*Bad bargaining by our condo association during a complex-wide refit.
posted by Opposite George at 10:06 PM on December 6, 2005

Wait -- I didn't account for the light the bulb produces!

You'd replace a 100W incandescent bulb with about a 25W fluorescent. That 25W fluorescent produces about 80 BTU/hr and consumes 160-270 BTU/hr at the powerplant. You'd need another 250 BTU/hr from the furnace to make up for the incandescent bulb, meaning your total consumption would be about 490 - 620 BTU/hr. So it's still a yes. The fluorescent/forced-hot-air gas setup uses about 30-45% less energy than the incandescent bulb.
posted by Opposite George at 10:18 PM on December 6, 2005

aims to deliver one free energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulb to every household in Canada

Wouldn't it be more economically and environmentally efficient if they delivered multiple bulbs to less households?

The psychology of behaviour and behavioural change with regard to climate change (and other environemtal issues) is one that is quite seriously under-researched currently.
posted by biffa at 6:32 AM on December 7, 2005

We've switched to CFL lighting over the past year, even on the front porch (Kitchener, Ontario). No problems with firing up in the cold, although the colder it is the dimmer they are when they start -- but they light up eventually anyway.

If you find CFL lights dim, then either get more lamps or buy brighter bulbs. A trio of 23-watt CFL bulbs in a ceiling fan fixture is almost blindingly bright. I have eight of the very large 26W spirals in my workshop -- boy howdy is that a lot of illumination.

Many of our CFLs are super-cheapies from Dollarama -- yes, that's right, a CFL bulb for a dollar. They start of really dim and don't get much brighter than a 60W incandescent, but for occasional lamps (or for use in that ceiling fan fixture when you don't want to be blinded) they're fine.

We have only two incandescents left: In the bathroom in a totally enclosed ceiling fixture.

My only complaint about them is that their color rendering index (CRI) is pretty pathetic. You can read and cook and live in general by them, but I wouldn't do color-dependent work (like print proofing) under CFL lighting.
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:04 AM on December 7, 2005