For the record, I'm not thrilled by CFL bulbs. The light quality is a little bit off from the incandescents I grew up with, and the time lag to come to full illumination is maddening. I am waiting the day for reasonably priced LED bulbs, to be honest.
That said, I do use CFLs in a number of places in my home, where either of the above conditions (light quality, illumination speed) aren't as important. And, by the same token, CFLs continue to improve in both those counts.
Why do I do this? Because I try to be a bit responsible for the world around me. Something that expends less energy and last longer is a good thing … or at least contains an intrinsic goodness that the disadvantages need to be weighed against.
Or I could just be a dolt, like Rep. Steve King. #ddtb
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Daily Kos: Rep. Steve King and the scary lightbulbs of scary doom
Rep. Steve King, Jedi master of lightbulbs
Rep. Steve King hates energy-efficient lightbulbs. He hates them the way other people might hate cockroaches, or malaria. He hates them exactly as much ……
I work in a hotel. We use them in the rooms and we do get many complaints about the time it takes them to come up to full brightness.
The most bizarre complaint was by a woman who demanded we get regular bulbs because she was "allergic to the light from the twisty ones."
I have not had an incandescent bulb in my apartment (in Cardiff, UK) for several years now. My main lights are CFLs and I have some LEDS which work very well as reading lights. I can honestly say that neither the colour nor the delay of CFLs bothers me at all. I no longer notice them.
Mind you, I lived with gas lights (in town) and paraffin lamps (in the country) until I was 11. You young things just don’t know how lucky you are 🙂
@David – I’m pleased that I’ve been able to get away with just using electricity for lighting (except, occasionally, while camping) in my life.
@Bill- Wow.
@Dave- I have to say that unless you have some that are like my ILs the ones we have only take a half a second to come to full brightness. You flick the switch and a half second later it is on so it isn't a big deal…however my ILs bought some that you flick the switch and it can take up to 5 minutes to come on. They have them in the bathroom and you have to turn the light on, they come on real dim at first, dimmer than a night light…but then walk away and come back if you need the light for anything. I am not sure where they got them from or what brand…but if you have issues like that then maybe yo should try different ones?
I’ve been slowly converting all of the lights in the condo from the old Incandescent bulbs to a mixture of LED and CFL (depending on what the light does) and plan on continuing to do so in the new house as well.
The only place I do not have LED’s or CFL’s is in the computer room where we have full specturm Halogen’s.
@BD – I need to take another look at the LED bulbs around out there, for use in some of our more frequently used lighting.
oo, thanks for that. Before the only places we could recycle anything like that (including batteries and the like) we either had to pay a fortune to mail the stuff out or drive hours. We hardly go to Home Depot, but there is a new one right down the street. This helps a lot!
And two of the full spectrum halogens is like looking into the sun. Being a flat fixture, none of the LEDs would fit.
Coming from Cal where electricity has been expensive for a long time, the CFLs bother me a whole lot less than they did 20 years ago. And they do sell ‘no-delay’ CFLs, but they often cost a bit more.
@Mary – I got some no-delay CFLs once, and, yes, they worked like champs. Then I couldn’t find them again. 😛
Dave, actually I have been very impressed with the types and styles of LED lights out there. Perhaps Mary needs to take you to McGuckin’s on Friday and show you the CLF/LED bulb selection. =P
Currently, the fancy old 40w bulbs have been being replaced with LED’s, both clear and frosted (because I have gotten confused as to what I have needed). These are in the Kitchen, dining area and Hallway.
Mary’s bathroom vanity bulbs are all LED now and those are the odd frosted globe type bulb.
The bulb over the fireplace is a CFL, the slow warm up kind…bought because we are moving.
It will be fun to go through the new house and see what needs to be replaced.
@BD – I do have a few in mind for the next time bulbs need replacing. And, as we discovered at McGuckins, one issue I’ll have to deal with is with non-dimmable LEDs.
It does seem that CFLs are quicker to light these days than they originally were. I still find that the one we have in our bathroom takes about 15 seconds to come up to full illumination, which is a bit annoying. Yes, I could replace it — but, then, one of the arguments of CFLs was that they were long-lasting and wouldn't need to be replaced as soon …
That is true…but we had one go out a few weeks ago that lasted just as long as a regular bulb. We still have regular bulbs that are still working that were in the apartment before we got the CFL… I don't like CFLs because you have to find some place to recycle them since they have mercury…so now I am stuck with this burned out bulb and not sure what to do with it.
I believe Home Depot has a recycling program for them.
My, I'm holding out for affordable LED bulbs.
More on recycling CFLs here: http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflrecycling.html