Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Bye - bye bulbs

A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many bad measures.

-Daniel Webster-

The last big fuel economy legislation package was enacted 32 years ago. Per Capita energy usage has increased dramatically since then. For one thing, it generated an abiding lust for ever more ridiculously large and heavy vehicles that even $3.50 a gallon gas prices haven't diminished and it did nothing to reduce the longer commutes and increased ferrying of all the little Codys and Madisons to their various activities and lessons.

Technology has indeed improved. Engines are more efficient and more reliable but it's been more than offset by every mother's need to drive an Army truck, by the death of public transportation in many places and by the further decentralization of the population. Dare we hope for a more practical approach in the new energy legislation that the House of Representatives is likely to pass today?

Seems like we can say good bye to incandescent light, our warm and friendly 19th century friend, and hello to harsh, flickering, mercury laden florescent bulbs or to the eerie and expensive aura of light emitting diode arrays. Phillips and GE, who played a large part in drafting the phase out of incandescents will get to sell you things that cost ten times or twenty times more.

I will miss light dimmers. They don't work with florescent light and I will have to find some other way to keep my bedroom and living room and dining room from looking like a hospital. Perhaps it will reduce my electric bill by two or three percent, but I doubt it. Most of the energy usage in my house is from water heating, pool heating, air conditioning and food refrigeration and the electric company is surely not going to freeze rates in response to decreasing demand.

Overall, the legislation is designed to reduce total consumption by 8% by 2030. That's not a lot and the benefit is questionable when one considers the environmental effects of brewing so much alcohol, producing so many silicon or gallium arsenide solar cells or the massive need for ever more petrochemical fertilizers to grow ever larger amounts of ever more expensive grains for fuel. It's really hard to know what the unintended consequences will be. It's likely that there will be more than an 8% increase in population in 23 years. It's hard to know what Americans will choose to drive to avoid the headaches of electric cars or the lack of utility of Smart Cars and it's far from certain that the government will retain it's desire to fund the billion and a half program for the next ten years.

I don't rest any easier knowing that the legislation was mostly drafted by the companies that stand to benefit the most and most quickly and I suspect that the $30,000,000 solar array to be built to power the Department of Energy (during peak daylight hours when the sun shines in Washington) will scarcely profit anyone but the people who sell solar cells.

It's not so much that I'm a reactionary cynic, although I am, but without a major shift in the way Americans live and work and breed, I fear this is only another kind of tokenism and another handout to big corporations and that the unintended consequences may be as bad or worse than doing nothing.

7 comments:

Buffalo said...

I know I am loath to switch to smaller and more economical modes of transportation. Mass transit appeals to me not in the least. There is no way I can consider myself to be part of the solution.

Capt. Fogg said...

I wouldn't mind switching to hydrogen if I could get the 600 HP I need!

Unfortunately I moved into a community 6 years ago that forbids motorcycles although I'm trying to change it. I have a severe case of Harley craving these days. Bikes use less gas and you can ride 12 months a year in Florida.

Intellectual Insurgent said...

Interesting that the rise of gated communities and their tyrannical HOA's coincides with increasing use of energy for the McMansions within them and the cost of gasoline to get from their secluded locations to workplaces.

Anonymous said...

We've switched to CF light bulbs in almost all the rooms in our house. Granted, they can't be dimmed but homestly I was surprised that they have solved a lot of the problems that I remembered from when CF bulbs first hit the market in the late 90's. The new breed of CF lights will surprise you. I switched out one bulb in the living room and when my wife came home, I asked her if she noticed anything different about the lights. She answered "No, the lights are fine. Why, what did you do?" I bought a bunch of the "green packs" from Home Depot because Southern California Edison was subsidizing the cost (4 CF bulbs for $3.50). More expensive, but they use 1/3 the power and last 9 years of average use. They are also working on dimmable CF bulbs, I expect that they will be mainstream in 2-5 years.

Capt. Fogg said...

I use florescents where I can, but they don't fit all applications and I do have a lot of dimmers. You're right though, they're getting cheaper and better but they still look like hell in an antique chandelier and they are much too big to replace tiny halogens and not bright enough for spotlights.

HOAs can be a real pain but they are everywhere in Florida from mobile home parks to communities of 50+ million dollar homes. It's been that way for a long long time.

My new home is twice the size of my old one and uses less energy, so it's hard to generalize and since no two are alike in this community, it's silly to call them Mcanythings. I designed and built this one myself and it's very energy efficient.

At first they didn't want to allow me a radio antenna, but when they figured out that I was the only one who could call the police, fire department, ambulance or their aunt Minnie in Iowa during a hurricane, they relented.

They will relent on motorcycles soon enough as the population is getting younger.

d.K. said...

News of this impending legislation made it to my local newspaper in this mornings' edition. It was obviously copied verbatim from the House press release, as there was not one bit of analysis in the article. It was painted as a win/win for everybody. I already knew that the alternative lighting was much more expensive, but even that nugget was omitted.

As far as the consumer goes, even if electric bills go down, we know that this then becomes the justification for the local utility plant to raise rates, right?

I'm venting and don't know what my point is. I'm all for more efficient energy use but these smoke and mirror tricks seem immoral at best.

Capt. Fogg said...

Too often these things are only a big win for the big corporations, although obviously we need to burn less fuel. I prefer to do it by slowly raising the price with a fuel tax and use the money for building windmills and the like, but that won't happen. Instead they'll make us drive these little golf carts.

Someone like me who doesn't commute hardly burns any gas while someone with a hybrid commuting 50 miles or more a day uses far more. It's not equitable and it makes more sense to let the people who use something most carry more of a burden.

And of course there's something bizarre about forcing someone to drive a "smart car" while his boat gets 600 yards per gallon.

Bio fuels are not an answer, since there isn't enough and since it may create more pollution than fossil fuels - and besides it will raise the cost of beer dramatically.