Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Light crimes & misdemeanors: light bulbs

Seems to me that when you start being more cost efficient with energy use, the power company raises rates because they aren't making enough profit. Endless cycle where you can never get ahead.

Joe’s in trouble with his Greenie pals so they dragged out this nonsense again to soothe their troubled hearts. I don’t have any chickens, and my plumbing is all inside, so it matters not, especially since the price of LEDs has come way down. Recently replaced the light over my kitchen sink with an LED fixture that doesn’t flicker, has no starter, and gives me three color temperatures to choose from. Live expectancy of the LED probably exceeds mine.

We use LEDs for starting plants in the basement and had to buy heat pads to put under the flats, so no energy savings there, probably the opposite. OTOH, both will last for years, maybe effectively forever, my forever anyway, so the cost will likely be offset by not having to replace them.

Our house has almost all low power use bulbs but there are places for old fashioned incandescents. Places like sheds or dusty basements where the lights are used less than an hour/year don't need expensive bulbs.

By MATTHEW DALY - Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration is scrapping old-fashioned incandescent light bulbs, speeding an ongoing trend toward more efficient lighting that officials say will save households, schools and businesses billions of dollars a year.

Rules finalized by the Energy Department will require manufacturers to sell energy-efficient lightbulbs, accelerating a longtime industry practice to use compact fluorescent and LED bulbs that last 25 to 50 times longer than incandescent bulbs. The Trump administration had slowed an earlier phaseout of incandescents, saying it was targeting rules that burden businesses.

Once the new rules are fully in place next year, consumers should save nearly $3 billion per year on their utility bills, the Energy Department said. The rules are projected to cut planet-warming carbon emissions by 222 million metric tons over the next 30 years, an amount equivalent to emissions generated by 28 million homes in one year, officials said.

“By raising energy efficiency standards for lightbulbs, we’re putting $3 billion back in the pockets of American consumers every year and substantially reducing domestic carbon emissions,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said in a statement Tuesday. “The lighting industry is already embracing more energy efficient products, and this measure will accelerate progress to deliver the best products to American consumers and build a better and brighter future.”

As a retired Lineman, I can tell you that most electric utilities can't just raise their rates when they want to. Most are governed by their States Public Service Commission. Rate increases have to be filed for and justified. My company seldom got the full increase that they ask for.