CFLs Causing Utility Woes 859
dacut writes "We've seen compact fluorescent lamps start to take over shelf space at the local hardware store. Replacing a 60 watt incandescent with a 13 watt CFL seems like a great savings, though many consumers are disappointed with the slow warm-up times, lower-than-advertised lifetimes, and hassles of disposing the mercury-containing bulbs. Now EDN reports they may use more energy than claimed due to their poor power factor. Mike Grather, of Lumenaire Testing Laboratory, 'checked the power factor for the CFLs and found they ranged from .45 to .50. Their "real" load was about twice that implied by their wattage.' The good news: you're only billed for the 13 watts of real power used. The bad news: the utilities have to generate the equivalent of 28 watts (that is, 28 VA of apparent power for you EEs out there) to light that bulb. Until they fix these issues, I'll hold on to my incandescents and carbon arc lamps, thanks."
Still... (Score:5, Interesting)
i like the slow warm up (Score:2, Interesting)
But still... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:That pretty bad (Score:3, Interesting)
I checked the power factor on my LCD big screen television as it uses fluorescent backlighting. I am very surprised that its 0.99. It looks like electronic power supplies can have perfect power factor. Would it cost much more to make a CFL with .99 pf too?
Re:But still... (Score:3, Interesting)
I have some high power ones (replacements for 75W incandescents) that turn on instantly, but they do get brighter after they've been on for a few minutes. They don't turn on to maximum brightness. It's not annoying or anything, just something I noticed. I use them in a torchier in the living room.
LED is a viable option in 40 Watt replacement (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Still... (Score:2, Interesting)
About 3 months ago I decided to switch over, and since then I've been slowly replacing all my incandescents with CFLs as they burn out. I was initially afraid of the flicker factor, since the flourescent tubes in my laundry room flicker like crazy and give me headaches when they are first turned on, especially when it's cold. However, I haven't really noticed any flicker with the CFLs so far.
I've had mixed luck. I initially decided to try switching some in the basement, where I'm less picky about the light. Bought a 4 pack of bulbs as a trial. I could hear them buzzing right away, so I returned them. This was a couple of years ago.
Then the hardware store started selling heavily subsidized (by PG&E, the local power company, i believe) bulbs, for only $1 a piece. I bought a few as a trial and they were much quieter, so I bought a bunch more and have been gradually replacing incandescents as they burn out.
The light isn't quite the same softness as an incandescent, but not nearly as harsh as I would have thought, and it hasn't really bothered me much.
But two of the bulbs after some use, but not a huge time (maybe a year?) have started to buzz in a very annoying way. If they all start to do this, I may stop the experiment and return to incandescents. Or do more expensive bulbs perform better over time?
I also bought a pair of (more expensive) CFL floodlights for the backyard. They take a ridiculous amount of time to warm up to full brightness. For the first couple of minutes it's a very dim light. I probably should've returned them, but it's too late now.
And I haven't seen any reasonably priced dimmable CFLs to test out (do you need a special dimmer?), so all of the lights that are on dimmer switches are still incandescents, even when they need replacing.
Re:CFL watt exaggeration (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:That pretty bad (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem lies in many things; with the environmental factor, for which a lot of people will run screaming for, while a lot of people just throw the CFLs in the garbage; with the much less than advertised life span, for which many people will run crying fool (I've had some 15$ bulbs put alongside a third normal one, both blew up in less than 3 months and the normal one lasted more than a year!); from the power company, which are subsidizing your usage of them because of the power factor; from the artist, which start crying when subjected to the bad white balances put off by CLDs; by those of us who lives in areas where the extra heat dissipated by the light bulbs just reduce the heating required from the central system; and I guess by many other people I can't think off.
Anyway, have fun adding more reasons :)
Re:LED is a viable option in 40 Watt replacement (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:So they are still more efficient (Score:3, Interesting)
The way forward is low-loss power conversion, from line voltage (120 or 240V) to X volts DC, at a high efficiency for both near-zero load (when your load is off) and the nominal active load. Power factor correction is going to become more than a nice-to-have, when a significant portion of the residential load is reactive and you start to get strange resonance effects between different appliances.
Re:Idea (Score:3, Interesting)
I think have a great idea as to how to solve this.
But unfortunately I'm still waiting for the CFL bulb above my head to light up.
I have to ask: who exactly is it that the summary claims is complaining about the heat-up delay on CFLs? My experience is that modern CFLs take no noticeable time to reach a brightness level that is completely acceptable. Did the poster only ask people who haven't tried a new lamp in the last 5 years?
In 1994... (Score:4, Interesting)
My mother inlaw bought 2 CFL to use in her kitchen. They are still going strong and they are probably the most used lights in her house. She paid a fair bit for them back in 94, but I'd say 15 years of consistent power savings has long since balanced out ;)
I've replaced all of the lights in my house with CFLs over the last 5 years. The only ones that have a slow light time are the super compact ones I got to fit in a specific light fixture. And the only 2 that have "burnt out" were due to excessive vibration (one in the garage) and another that I caught with a chunk of sheet rock while remodeling.
And most of them are from the elcheapo 5-packs that I paid under $15 for.
I've had no issues with flickering, the color quality is quite warm (I actually have to bring in a colder light when I'm painting, but for room lighting they are great). So even if they are sucking up 28 watts instead of 14, that's still 1/2-1/4 what I would be sucking up using 60-100watt bulbs.
-Rick
Re:Speaking of conscience... (Score:2, Interesting)
Accepting for a moment that your statistic is true, which I don't believe, it is a lot easier to put one scrubber on one smokestack to remove the mercury (and other particulates and pollution) than it is to prevent the escape of the mercury from hundreds or thousands of households using CFLs. It takes zero consumer education to put a scrubber on a smokestack, it takes zero user action. Users can't simply "break" the scrubber like they can drop a CFL. And when a user drops a CFL, the problem is right there in their house, not miles away.
While the amount may be bigger by burning coal, the solution is easier and more likely to be successful. And already required to deal with sulphur and other pollutants. Recycling CFLs is a new concept for every person who starts buying CFLs and impossible to enforce.
As soon as I use up the CFLs I was confused into buying, I'm going back to incandescents.
Re:Still... (Score:3, Interesting)
This is true. I worked from home starting in 1999, and had incandescents burning out several times per month in my office. 50 cent bulbs or cheaper, go figure. I switched them in 2000 for some Philips Marathon bulbs at $15 or $20 each. One of them was still going strong when I left it in my apartment when I moved out last year. On the other hand, some of the cheap CF bulbs I bought from Canadian Tire didn't even last six months, in places where I wasn't using them nearly as much. Maybe those old Philips bulbs didn't save me money in the long run, but they saved me a lot of hassle with replacements.
Re:Summary is wrong. (Score:3, Interesting)
This isn't perfectly accurate, but it's probably good enough. (No offence is meant.)
Power factor:
When you put electricity through an object, some part of it will get used up. If you have a simple load like a resistor, it will use it up linearly.
No loads in real life are linear. Let's take a motor. It's got lots of coils of wire to make it spin. The coils create a magnetic field. The creation of the magnetic field makes the current slow down, so the current starts to lag the voltage. Not all coils of wire are motors, and you don't actually require the coil to get an "inductive load".
On the other side, if you have a gap in the line, you end up slowing down the voltage. You generally get those with capacitors.
The amount of slowdown is called "phase shift". Don't ask why that happens: you'd probably get a Nobel prize if you managed to figure it out. Just accept that it does.
If you're really good, you can design a circuit where the slowed current and the slowed voltage can line up again.
Let's go back to the motor example. Big factories use lots of motors, and there's no reason for them to have capacitors to compensate. In comes the power company, who then has to deal with these strange phase differences on their lines. They charge more money based on the power factor. Low power factor fucks up their calculations, so they charge more for it. A hell of a lot more.
Calculating the power factor requires some vector analysis. Basically, you draw a bunch of lines at angles and then add them up. If you're running a power factor of .50, then 50% of the power you're using isn't being measured by the power company's basic meters. That pisses them off. One they find you, they'll make you pay for all that power.
Does that help?
Re:CFL watt exaggeration (Score:3, Interesting)
Old cars got better mileage than new hybrids.
Old toilets used less water than new toilets (since you only ever had to flush once).
CRTs are the best display technology we have by far.
CFLs contain mercury and are absolutely not green.
The production of solar cells is far more detrimental to the environment than any energy source they could replace.
LI-ION batteries are inferior to NI-MH batteries, and are more detrimental to the environment.
Analog phone lines are the most reliable communication method we have, yet in a time when we're told we need to worry about our "infrastructure", especially for emergencies, they're ripping it out of the ground as fast as they can.
Antibacterial everything is breeding more resistant bacteria.
Our economic recovery plan revolves around giving money we don't have to the very companies that lost billions of dollars that they didn't really have in the first place.
Alcohol and cigarettes kill more people and cost more money (health care) than marijuana and cocaine.
What, you expect shit to make sense?
Re:Harshness is all about color temperature (Score:5, Interesting)
Fluorescent bulbs don't have color temperatures defined.
Yes, they do. Look at the box.
Fluorescent bulbs are very much band-limited, unlike broad band black body radiators.
And the color temperature rating for fluorescents is based on the weighted average of where its power output lies.
Heck, they do an okay job of offsetting your heating bill, in the winter.
Electric heat is inefficient. And electric heat in the summer means more AC. Adding extra heat to your house is overall definitely not a good thing.
Re:Speaking of conscience... (Score:5, Interesting)
And when a user drops a CFL, the problem is right there in their house, not miles away.
A CFL typically contains 3mg of mercury. A tuna steak is likely to contain as much as 1mg. If you eat fish three times and break a CFL once (and snort the mercury rather than disposing of it safely), you'll take in as much mercury from the fish as the broken lamp.
Re:Stopgap (Score:1, Interesting)
LEDs still need DC, not AC. Feed AC to an LED and you get a nice 60Hz strobe light (see also: LED christmas lights). Maybe you can't see 60Hz, but I can and it makes me want to get a baseball bat to fix it.
So you still need a power supply("ballast") that has a high PF for converting AC->DC.
Or we need to figure out how to rewire houses to have a single AC->DC conversion point, and pipe DC around to the lighting fixtures. With LEDs, that might be plausible, but I haven't done the math.
LED packages that take AC have been available for a couple years now.
http://ledsmagazine.com/news/2/2/8
And the low voltage DC thing? Tesla and Edison worked that out a century ago. RI^2 losses tend to be higher with low voltages, and losses in distribution may negate the reduction in conversion stages.
Re:LED is a viable option in 40 Watt replacement (Score:4, Interesting)
Just put in a ton of CREE LR6s in our kitchen/family room renovation. 650 lumens at only 12 watts (a 65W floodlight replacement.) The CRI is 92 with the 2700K bulb. Power factor is > 0.95. Rated at 50,000 hours (and have a 3 year warranty if they die before then) These are great bulbs. They retail for about $100, I was able to get them for $80/per on sale.
Re:Still... (Score:4, Interesting)
We've had this particular discussion on slashdot before. A lot of people, including me, had initially good results with CFLs, but it seems in the last couple of years the average lifespan has decreased significantly. Speculation is that, at least with some manufacturers, they've fallen victim of "value engineering".
My own experience: My first two CFLs, purchased in the mid-nineties, still work fine. Of the Costco eight-count blister-pack I purchased last November, only three are still working.
Re:Still... (Score:3, Interesting)
I didn't mean to justify the use of incandescent bulbs, I just meant to point out that if you were really concerned about wasted power, you'd be telling me to do one or more of the following:
etc etc.
Re:mercury (Score:1, Interesting)
Except that you can power a regular bulb with a power source that does not require mercury.
This bogus "fact" comes up every time someone mentions the mercury in CFLs, and it's bullshit because while you CAN remove the dependence on mercury in regular bulbs, no such luck in CFLs.
Re:Arrgh! (Score:1, Interesting)
Finally a voice of reason!
The other side of the coin that many are not considering is that numerous other devices around the house and local suburb have an inductive load (air-conditioner motors for one) that is opposite to the capacitive load that CFL's generate. Therefore by installing CFLs in your house you may actually be compensating for the inductive load and 'reducing' the load on the utility (bringing the PF back in line so to speak).
AB
Re:Speaking of conscience... (Score:5, Interesting)
Ok, here we go - someone check the math.
http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs095-01/ [usgs.gov]
Tells me the mean amount of mercury in US coal is 0.17ppm.
We will assume 100% of said mercury enters the air.
We will also talk about 100 watt incandescent bulbs to make the math easier.
450 grams of coal are burned to deliver 1 KWh to your outlet.
http://www.amazon.com/Incandescent-Light-Shape-Frosted-100A19/dp/B000273TEA [amazon.com]
100 Watt bulb, 20,000 hours.
2,000 KWh in its lifetime.
900,000 grams of coal burned for this light bulb over its 20,000 hour lifetime.
153mg of mercury in said coal.
http://www.energystar.gov/ia/partners/promotions/change_light/downloads/Fact_Sheet_Mercury.pdf [energystar.gov]
tells me the average CFL has 4mg of mercury in it.
I was going to work out a full hour-by-hour comparison - but there is not need. I the case is B/W enough, unless someone can convince me less than 4% of mercury makes it up the stack.
Re:Power factor compensators (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, sort of - but doesn't ald old-fashioned spinning-disk type meter measure current, regardless of the power factor?
No, it does not - that would be silly. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_meter#Electromechanical_meters [wikipedia.org]
Re:Still... (Score:5, Interesting)
Looking a bit further ahead, another company called Vu1 has a novel idea for a light which uses electron stimulation against phosphor to produce light (sorta like a crt). It has no mercury and is also dimmable. It's also shaped like a regular incandescent so lamp shades will fit on it. They will be less expensive than LEDs and produce much better color rendering, but they will likely cost more than CFLs.
Re:Speaking of conscience... (Score:3, Interesting)
The initial power surge to kick off the light will eat into your usage and savings --
Sorry dacut, but that is another myth. The actual simple reason is that a rarely-used bulb uses very little power. So you cannot save enough to justify the extra cost of the CFL. That will change eventually when CFLs get cheap enough.
Re:Arrgh! (Score:1, Interesting)
As an individual that works for the utility company I can tell you that this PF issue is a big concern for the utilities. The end result is higher price per KW to compensate for the costs incurred due to low PF CFL's. New CFL's coming out in the next month or so will have a PF>0.95 for the same cost as the units on the shelves. This will remove the PF concern and increase the life span of the bulb for the consumer.
Re:Still... (Score:5, Interesting)
You say "run of the mill", but IIRC the only brand that hasn't died at all yet in the Consumer Reports lifetime test is GE.
Re:LED is a viable option in 40 Watt replacement (Score:5, Interesting)
I've purchased LED lights for my house and was extremely disappointed with their performance and efficiency. However, as you said, the Cree XRE and other recent high power LEDs can be made into very efficient and nice looking lights. Problem is, they haven't yet - at least not that I have been able to find. As far as I have found so far, the LED manufacturers have the goods, but the light "bulb" manufacturers have not yet taken advantage of all the latest LED tech.
There's also the typical BS found in many new industries where cheapo manufacturers take advantage of the hype and produce sub-par products at very low prices. It's an easy one in this case because one of the major points is cost. This should shake out eventually and we'll see better quality products hit the market. I just want it to hurry up.
I hate CFLs because the ONLY good thing about them is their lower power consumption. But to manufacture them is very dirty and they have mercury in them, so they can't be disposed of cleanly either. I don't like the slow start up speed or the color temperature. I bought a few packs of CFLs before finding all this out so I'm still using them. But I will not buy any more. I'm dying for LEDs to come to the main stream.
It's not a surprise to find that the power factor of CFLs sucks too. Again, cheapo manufacturers trying to cash in on a trend. Quality manufacturers know how to handle power factor problems.
Re:Harshness is all about color temperature (Score:1, Interesting)
In my experience you can dim all CFLs, you just have to turn them on at full power then dim them down. If you try to bring them up from zero voltage, you'll smoke 'em. Of course not all dimmers allow for this.
Re:Harshness is all about color temperature (Score:3, Interesting)
full of people trying desperately to come up with a way to justify their decision to spend *way* more money in electricity and increase emissions because they're too lazy or stuck in their ways to merely change their lightbulbs
You let me know when there is a replacement tehcnology because CFLs are not it. I was enthusiastic years ago, and recently gave it one more try. After experiencing the problems listed below and the costs, I have returned to incandescent and halogen bulbs.
Problems I have experienced:
1) Lose of brightness over time. All CFLs suffer from this problem.
2) Slow warm up over time. All CFLs suffer from this problem.
3) Power cycling affects bulb life; recommended for applications with 15+ minutes.
4) Cannot be used in high heat or extreme cold applications.
5) Heat build up, affecting ballast life and brightness.
6) Small bulbs not available for applications such as chandelier.
7) Special dimmable bulbs.
8) Buzzing from ballast. The statndard advice of buying from high quality manufacturer is moot since all admit to quality issues.
9) Disposal.
Re:You can fix your laundry room bulbs (Score:3, Interesting)
If this post is correctly using the term/acronym cfl, then they are referring to the high frequency lights that fit in modern bulb sockets. Old school ballasts for florescent tubes that we are used to in schools and office buildings would never fit, and as far as i know don't exist in this form factor.
There are CFL fixtures that have separate ballasts. They're usually only seen in older commercial installations. The ones I had to deal with had a simple magnetic ballast (not a mechanical ballast, there's no such thing), and when you replaced the lamp it was just a specially packaged fluorescent tube with no electronics.
The term "CFL" was used by the manufacturers; the lamp was a GE Biax, and you could change the wattage by just changing the tube. When we sold the building I kept the stock of replacement tubes since I was able to pick up a ballast/socket adapter that would screw into a regular lamp fixture. Worked great in the garage, but I wouldn't use them in the living room due to flicker.
I remember buying a replacement ballast for one fixture. It was basically a simple inductor, and remarkably inexpensive. There was basically no way to convert the fixtures over to electronic ballasts, but there wasn't any point since they were used as hallway lights in an office building.
I have replaced magnetic ballasts in the old-style 4 foot office fixtures with electronic ballasts, but it's generally a better idea to replace the whole fixture. The socket terminals oxidize over time, and the sockets get brittle with age. Retrofits only make sense in a commercial environment where you'd have to replace a large number of fixtures and the small saving by replacing only the ballasts add up.
Re:Still... (Score:2, Interesting)
Most power factor meters just measure lead and lag and give you a number which is useful for motors. The odd loading of the CFL (and LEDs) means its power factor may be much worse than you have seen. There are reports of power factors of the CFLs sold in Australia can be below .20. They are also replacing all the meters here with ones that compensate for bad power factor. Someone has since nice graphs from his oscilloscope where he demonstrates just how bad it is.
I find it nearly impossible to explain power factor to most people so I've been explaining it as an electricity grid efficiency factor. That 100W old school bulb will waste about 7 VA in the grid here yet its replacement CFL will waste nearly 14 VA.
Re:Harshness is all about color temperature (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Harshness is all about color temperature (Score:2, Interesting)
OTOH, a resistive heater adds 1 Joule of heat by consuming 1 Joule from the grid (minus a smidge lost in your outside wiring).
Re:Harshness is all about color temperature (Score:3, Interesting)
1. I have two types of CFLs, dirt cheap ones that light up with 5 sec delay to 50% brightness and reach 100% after couple minutes. Those I use in places where that doesn't matter. The better ones (do cost more but are not expensive) light up to 90+% instantly.
2. Probably true, standard marketing BS. I just buy ones with highest wattage.
3. Philips CFLs do seem to work in outdoor lights at -20C temperatures, though there is a couple second delay.
4. I have dirt cheap CFLs in my sauna and they seem to work.
5. Not really a problem and as others have said, using the saved wattage to heatpump is more efficient.
6. You missed one.
7. Incandescent bulbs seem to last about a year, two if I am lucky. Outdoors they last one winter. So far not one of the CFLs I've bought has failed, oldest ones are over 10 years old.
8. Might be true, I'd like to see a study on this (CFL compared to incandescent).
9. Never had a dimmer, I prefer binary lighting.
10. Why wouldn't they work with motion sensors?
Hey, I have no idea what incandescent bulbs cost. Good CFLs cost over 20-30 times more, but they still make sense to me, especially as I do value my time and don't want to keep replacing broken bulbs all the time.
Re:LED is a viable option in 40 Watt replacement (Score:2, Interesting)
Um, sunlight isn't perfect white light. It's more of a yellowish tinge. People don't actually feel comfortable in perfect white light.