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Over at the BBC’s Green Room, Dr. Matt Prescott has a bright idea: ban traditional incandescent light bulbs. Their replacements would be TreeHugger-friendly compact fluorescents, which, Dr. Prescott notes, “produce[s] the same amount of light as an incandescent light bulb whilst being responsible for the emission of 70% less carbon dioxide. It also saves money; about £7 ($12) per year in the UK, more or less in other countries depending on electricity prices. They waste so much energy that if [incandescents] were invented today, it is highly unlikely they would be allowed onto the market.” Further, “It has been estimated that if every household in the US replaced just three of its incandescent light bulbs with energy-saving designs and used them for five hours per day, it would reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 23 million tonnes, reduce electricity demand by the equivalent of 11 coal-fired power stations and save $1.8bn.” Sounds pretty good to us; how are we going to achieve this?

Originally by Collin Dunn from Treehugger on February 27, 2006, 9:28am