Are Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs Good for the Environment?
Filed under: Earth911 – November 7, 2007 By Jackson Kuhl Almost every news story about global warming recommends that consumers switch from incandescent light bulbs to more efficient compact fluorescent light bulbs, or CFLs. But are CFLs really that good for the environment? Incandescent light bulbs use electricity to heat a filament to a white-hot state, producing light. Yet 90 percent of the energy used is wasted as heat, according to General Electric’s Web site. Compact fluorescent light bulbs use electricity to excite gas within a glass tube. The gas fluoresces, producing ultraviolet light which the human eye cannot see. This UV light then reacts with mercury and a phosphorescent chemical compound inside the tube to create visible light. Because CFL bulbs do not use heat as the lighting mechanism, less energy is spent to create an equivalent amount of light. The packaging of an N:Vision-brand CFL bulb purchased at Home Depot, for example, states that it uses only 14 watts to produc
