Talk:Compact fluorescent lamp/Archive 3

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

User Wtshymanski seems to want to edit-war with me over the stupidest thing. Can someone just cast an eye over this and see if I'm going mad. The article currently says, "Some manufacturers make CFL bulbs with [foo]. The manufacturer claims that [bar]". As part of a general copyedit I changed this to, "Some manufacturers make CFL bulbs with [foo]. It is claimed that [bar]". It seems obvious that, without checking the entire history, this used to say, "One manufacturer makes CFL bulbs with [foo]. The manufacturer claims that [bar]", and the first half was later pluralised, leaving the second not reading right. I refuse to break the three-revert rule over Wtshymanski's argument with this, but why should this one silly detail be left in a mess because of his edits? Maybe someone who gives-a-damn can find a short wording that is neither passive nor blatantly wrong, to make him happy? Jeez. --Nigelj (talk) 16:40, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

In the time it took you to type that, you could have checked the reference and fixed both sentences. The reference says there's only one manufacturer claiming this. Stamp out passive voice wherever you find it. Relax, it's only Wikipedia. --Wtshymanski (talk) 17:05, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Who else makes it? Is there any third-party testing that shows the purported effect actually works? --Wtshymanski (talk) 02:13, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I propose a new article to discuss the perceived issues with fluorescents (which would include CFL's). This article, and the

What kind of issues? There should at least be a more devoted and comprehensive section on health issues, manufacturing quality, etc. Freefighter (talk) 23:41, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

You have completely missed my point. I'll work on this later and you'll see what I was talking about.

talk • contribs

) 06:22, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

I understand what you were talking about now. I agree with your proposal. My point is that the two articles from which you wish to extract the similar sections seem to be one-sided. Criticisms/issues are not as visible as the rest of the information in the articles. They seem to give a one-sided picture of the subject. Will you be leaving small sections in each of the articles about issues with a link to the main issue article? Freefighter (talk) 22:04, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Has any research been done to evaluate the safeness of CFLs? I have briefly searched through some academic databases and found no papers on safety. Someone, direct me in a good direction. 24.141.172.175 (talk) 23:39, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

There is good evidence of the health effects discussed fully on the fluorescent lamp article. However, I have just added information on safety in hallways, but more could be added about other deleterious health effects. Peterlewis (talk) 17:20, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

This article is tagged with Category:Articles with images not understandable by color blind users. Why? Is it because of the photograph comparing several lit bulbs and discussing color temperature? If so, we should strike the category, IMO, because the purpose of the category is to get the articles 'cleaned up' so they can be more color-blind-friendly; but this is applicable mostly to graphs or charts that are unnecessarily unfriendly, and a color temperature comparison photo can never be 'cleaned up' in this way, or you may as well tag every article containing any photo containing both green and red colors. Tempshill (talk) 05:09, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm severely colour blind and this article contains no non-understandable images. Indeed, it should be commended for the use of symbols in the "Electricity use by bulb type" image. Removing from category. Thanks for bringing this to my attention, sorry for the delay. Andrew Oakley (talk) 22:21, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Who is credited for inventing the flourescent bulb? In what country does the inventor belongs? Please provide as soon as possible. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 119.95.240.102 (talk) 13:48, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

I've removed

I've also fact tagged this [2]. It sounds like it was written by someone who has no idea what they're talking about. Chronic exposures are usually set well below the level that is believed to likely to result in any significant negative effect. An exposure 300x the limit sounds bad, but it depends how often and how long you are exposed. For example if you are exposed for around 30 minutes each day for 30 days, that means you are exposed to 900 minutes of 300x limit. Presuming an immediate drop off to normal levels (unlikely but for simplicity) that means you're exposed to the equivalent 270k minutes of exposure at the limit. That means you're exposed to 187.5 days of equivalent exposure at the limit. In other words, it's like you've added 187.5 days to you're life in terms of mercury. Bad but not necessarily the immediate disaster the article makes out. The bigger concern is whether such an exposure might have acute effects as well as whether such an exposure might cause problems for people sensitive to the effects of mercury like children. In other words, while there is concern, it's a lot more nuasanced then that sentence makes out and it's mostly a case of we don't know. This is reflected in the Maine study which says "Finally, it is unclear what the exact health risks are from exposure to low levels of elemental mercury, especially for sensitive populations, so advising for the careful handling and thoughtful placement of CFLs may be important". In other words, the section needs to be drasticly improved with reliable sourcing. Sadly I don't have any so I can't do it. Nil Einne (talk) 16:18, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

On second thought, I just removed the claim it was hazardous and instead added the more nuasanced position of the Maine DEP study, that we don't know what the health risks are. Nil Einne (talk) 16:26, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

This is a great article, very informative. But I think the "Other CFL Technologies" section is in dire need of a citation for the passage that discusses cold cathode fluorescent (CCFL) technology. There is very little on the 'Net that provides information of the relative efficiency of CCFLs. This article is the only one I found. CCFLs are an exciting alternative to conventional CFLs because of the quality of light they emit. (There is more to light quality than Kelvins.) So it is important to know how the author came up with the figure of "half that of CFLs".Star-lists (talk) 22:57, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

we need to leave the CO2-greenhouse gas references out of the article since the entire idea of CO2 being a greenhouse gas is still unproven and falling from favor. Please limit text to verifiable facts such as power savings, ROI improvements and such. There are more than enough valid and documentable reasons to use CFLs without delving into bad science. Ken (talk) 04:33, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Nonsense. --Nigelj (talk) 17:15, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

I have provided a soruce from an engineer trade magazine. How much better of a source can I get? QUOTE: However recent studies show CFLs may not save as much energy as indicated, due to their reactive power nature, forcing power companies to expend energy to balance the load. In other words, the actual energy reduction is only 50% rather than 75% -. "Their real load was about twice that implied by their wattage." ^[1] ---- Theaveng (talk) 15:24, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Because it's from a blog. Cheers,

propaganda_deeds

15:27, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Um... no. It's from the magazine of a website called Engineering Design News. Would you prefer I dig-up my paper copy and link to that instead? Would that make it acceptable, because I can certainly do that. ---- Theaveng (talk) 15:33, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, cite the paper copy of the magazine. Because the URL you cited definitely contained "/blog/" within the URI. Cheers,

propaganda_deeds

15:36, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

It's not just the blog issue. The cited column does not support the claims you make in the deleted text. You are drawing conclusions (OR) from an offhand account of one conversation that are not warranted. The full paragraph reads: "Coincidentally, after our email exchange I ran into Mike Grather of Luminaire Testing Laboratory. He recently ran a series of life-cycle and performance tests on a batch of 100 CFLs with various power ratings averaging approximately 20W each. They assumed a PF for the lights of at least .75 and sized the power supply at 3KVA. However, when they powered up the bank of CFLs, the 3KVA supply was inadequate. Grather 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." In other words, they needed a power supply with a higher KVA rating, i.e. since voltage is fixed, one that could supply more current. KVA rating in NOT power consumption. That is what power factor is all about. In fact column describes a conversation with the EPA where it is stated that CFL power factor effects are in the noise level in terms of impact. --agr (talk) 16:02, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Could we confine use of the phrase "highly dangerous" to things are at least as, or more deadly, than a pack a day cigarette habit? I watch a lot of television and I've never seen a SWAT team summoned because someone was threatening to drop a light bulb. "Hand over the money and no-one gets mercury poisoning!" George Bush didn't send the troops to sieze Al-Qaeda's stocks of light bulbs.

If you smashed every fluorescent lamp in North America at once and vaporized all their mercury content, you'd be putting less mercury into the biosphere than the Flin Flon smelter used to dump into the air every couple of months^{[citation needed]}. Mercury can kill you. So can tap water, in sufficient amounts - more people have been killed by water than by mercury in the last 100 years ^{[citation needed]}. There's quite possibly more mercury locked up in people's jaws than in all the CFLs of a major city. ^{[citation needed]}

As I write this, my cordless phone is in use in a room lit by 5 of the killer lightbulbs and seemingly unimpaired by the storm of RFI coming from each bulb. Nor has our couch faded from the toxic UV rays beaming out of the lamps. BPA causes some reproductive anomalies in rats and gets banned; trans fats somehwat increase probability of heart disease and get banned; it's not like consumer products are unregulated.

We are past the point of describing legitimately-held significant sincere minority opinions. Any further descriptions of light bulbs as highly dangerous I can no longer regard as good-faith edits and I will treat and tag as vandalism reversions. Let's have some proportionality. CFLs are a flawed technology, but usable and useful within their limits.

--Wtshymanski (talk) 16:12, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

We could use an article called something like

light sensitivity that redirects to photophobia, but a more inclusive title could collect all the stuff that keeps getting put into this article. --Wtshymanski (talk

) 18:32, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Light sensitivity is not in any sense an imagined psychological condition; photophobia is a correct diagnosis and article.

Removing any reference to adverse health effects is an absolute lie, done to promote econazis' beliefs that low energy lightbulbs are the Earth's saviour. Concealing the truth and creating verisimilitudinous versions of truth may be part and parcel, business-as-usual in some sections of ecofascist circles, but it doesn't cut the mustard with science or reality.

Nimbow7 (talk) 14:19, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Godwin's Law

says that I'm wasting my time in this thread but: "Pathological" <> "imaginary". There are effects (such as siezures, rashes, etc.) other than the behaviour of avoidance of light. Sure, talk about *verifiable* adverse health effects, and no doubt once 1000-lumen LED lamps are $2 each the CFL will go the way of the incandescent lamp - but keep it real.

No-one who's thoughtful and reasonable says that CFLs are going to save the Earth. But they have utility as a low-cost way of reducing electric power consumption. However, you can't argue with a straw man. --Wtshymanski (talk) 21:41, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Could we get a citation of a quotation from one or more prominent Ecnonazis saying that CFLS will save the Earth? I must have missed coverage of the Nuremberg-style rallies of the Econazis. --Wtshymanski (talk) 21:52, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Oohh...ooohhh...is this (Bruno Tobback) one of *them* ? --Wtshymanski (talk) 15:27, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

I fail to see the relevance of LEDs at $2 or $2000, or CFL's inevitable demise; the problem here is that any inclusion of negative effects of CFLs is routinely removed. Anything else is a "straw man".

But they don't need Nuremberg. They have Greenpeace.

Nimbow7 (talk) 00:19, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Well done Wtshymanski for removing Health Issues from this article once more. Could you please explain how describing health issues arising from the use of CFLs is "disproportionate coverage"? Otherwise I see no reason to exclude health effects arising from the use of CFLs and shall reinstate it. As far as I can tell, the only reason for constantly removing legitimate coverage of side-effects and health problems from the article is to cosset CFLs in a flattering biased manner. Additionally, the article

Light sensitivity is not the correct placement for health issues arising from CFLs; the correct place for CFL health issues is the article on CFLs, or a seperate article dealing entirely with CFL side effects. Nimbow7 (talk

) 18:56, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

O, would that I had such an untroubled life that this debate ould engage my passions to such a degree.99.73%^[citation needed] of all people will lead their lives without ever thinking twice about CFLs. And of the remaining 0.27%, many of those unfortunates can't walk outdoors on a sunny day without protecting themselves. --Wtshymanski (talk) 19:19, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Actually if one reads the health issues, the potential numbers of people affected by light and CFLs is 250,000 in the EU. Additionally, 100% of everyone can be affected by excessive UV emanations from CFLs; 20% of a population is afflicted with migraine, 10-20% by polymorphous light eruption, 3.3% have Actinic Prurigo, 3.1% Solar Urticaria, 21% of CFS sufferers are affected by artificial light sources, 5-20% of the population photophoia, and so on. But that is all irrelevant. Are you seriously suggesting that because a minority (however substantial) may be affected by something as common as light bulbs, that is to mean that there should be no inclusion of Health Issues? Perhaps you should engage your sincerely held "passions" elsewhere and with scientific reinforcement instead of rhetorical beliefs that can lead to overwhelming bias and a lack of neutrality. I take it there is no real objection to the inclusion of Health Issues other than the passionate belief that they be excluded. Nimbow7 (talk) 20:01, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

• Please see my reply in the 'absurd bias' section below about working on the health section, which still needs a lot of work before we consider what to do with it.
  247
  08:20, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

The cited "Telegraph" story doesn't say CFLs don't put out as much light as they are supposed to, but rather, that some manufacturers claim a CFL replaces a higher-wattage incandescent than really warranted. I removed the "lux" measurements because that's the wrong unit - the manufacturer of the bulb can't control how many lux you're going to get because he doesn't know how far away your lighted surface is going to be. The "Telegraph" story also doesn't really tell me that they considered the possibility of different light distribution between a CFL and an incandescent - these will generally be different, the emitters have different shapes after all, and I don't think their stated methodolgy of measuring lux at some point takes this into account.

Dividing rated lumens by pi square metres indicates that the incandescents should have produced around 222 lux, and the CFLs around 194 lux,average, at the stated half-metre distance. Their numbers are less than half that size. Something is odd about the measurements that are only capturing half of the light that should be coming off the lamps. Is the problem with the lamp or the measuring method? They should have used a photometric laboratory's integrating sphere. Or are the incandescent bulb manufacturers also fibbing about their lighting power?

The "Telegraph" item says that CFLs producing 600 lumens are sold as replacement for incandescents producing 700 lumens. This appears to be a reasonable guide to the consumer.

The "Telegraph" article quotes a politician saying that lumens measure brigtness. They don't, they measure quantity of light. How you spread the light around determines how "bright" something is. Even a politician should know the difference between a 1000 watt lamp on a pole lighting up a parking lot to some low level, vs. a 20 watt reading lamp that makes his desktop brighter! It's as if you asked "How deep is the pool?" and got the answer "7000 gallons" - it's the wrong units. --Wtshymanski (talk) 18:41, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

The Telegraph's in-house light meter may be too sensitive to parts of the spectrum not so prevalent in CFLs (e.g. red or I/R?) compared to the human eye. Maybe it was designed for use with black-and-white film rather than for scientific experimentation? The EU original that they based their story on (before they started their in-house experimenting), is much more even handed, saying "compact fluorescent lamps can produce just as much light as incandescent bulbs" and it's just a packaging problem that they're working on. The scale of the problem is much less than The Telegraph's 50% too - using 15W instead of 11-12W CFLs to replace a 60W incandescent is more than good enough. They also recommend specifying lamps in lumens, which take account of the eye's response across the visible spectrum. It might be better to re-write the section again based on the real published facts rather than the newspaper's bowdlerization of them. The section is called 'Light output' after all, not 'The Daily Telegraph's claims regarding light output'. --Nigelj (talk) 20:51, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. The newpaper article is dubious, at best. --Wtshymanski (talk) 21:04, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

It is incorrigible that all references to adverse health effects from use of CFLs are routinely removed, undoubtedly by persons with an axe to grind.

This is not your pet project to lie to the world about the safety of CFLs. Fully documented adverse health effects must be included, not removed because they harm the image of CFLs. This article should not adhere to your personal point of view. Nimbow7 (talk) 13:39, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

You're correct in that an article shouldn't adhere to someone's personal point of view, which is why your text was removed until it's brought in line with policy. Your talk page details the issue, but as a summary you can't cite a study and only report half of the conclusions that meet your point of view. If you want assistance getting the text up to scratch I'd be happy to help, but essentially just be thorough and don't leave out the bits you don't like. Further it may be time due to

247

19:20, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

I would be most grateful for any help you or anyone may offer, as it seems only one point of view (CFLs are amazing and any negative aspects are lies, damn lies!) is being put across.

Re a subarticle on negative health issues as per

WP:UNDUE

seems wrong to me - "Neutrality requires that the article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by a reliable source, and should do so in proportion to the prominence of each" seems to fit the bill here of an even-handed, neutral, fair representation of the facts. Unless, of course, it can be argued that all research currently in existance is of such a poor standard that it cannot be relied upon to prove or disprove CFL's safety, and is therefore a minority belief. There is no evidence purporting to CFL's infallible safety record, yet much evidence (albeit at various levels of proof) of delitirious effects, even within documents cited as incontrovertible definitiveness by unbridled pro-CFL supporters.

I'll do my best to create balance but it should be a joint effort, not the one-sided representation of half-truths at present.

Nimbow7 (talk) 00:10, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

In addition, it is important to note the difference between there being a lack of data and proof of data. See

negative evidence. Nimbow7 (talk

) 02:32, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Let's do one thing at a time, thus we should probably sort the SCENIHR text first. The source is fine, the problem was (as noted on your talk page) that only certain bits of the sourced text were included in the article, which dramatically changed what the study had concluded in some cases. Essentially, the sourced conclusions need checked to ensure the article reflects what the study had concluded. I created this subpage to do this. I put in the old text, thus it's now simply a matter of checking the source and amending the old text as needed for compatibility with inclusion policies.

Once the text on the subpage is sorted, we can discuss merging it into the article, or the possibility of having health, environment, mercury, etc branched off so that those issues can get due and significant coverage without overwhelming the main article. Again, we should hold off on that discussion and do one thing at a time.

Thanks for taking that step. I do like the idea of having it be a separate article eventually. One reason I like that is that most of the issues there are equally applicable to any fluorescent lamps, not just compact. So it could become an article about those issues in general, and both CFL and FL articles could point to it. Ccrrccrr (talk) 12:52, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

I agree, thanks Nja247 for your help. I had re-read some of the SCENIHR report and added some more material to craete a (hopefully) more balanced approach. If it's ok I'll just go ahead and update the workpage you've set up with the updated text. I'd also begun work on a seperate article for CFL (or indeed FL, good point Ccrrccrr) health issues, but I can only work on articles when I have suitable time to do so. I'll update that text over at User:Nja247/SCENIHR now. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nimbow7 (talk • contribs) 23:59, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

No problem, that's what I'm here for. I briefly scanned a couple lines and it looks better, but I'd like to go over it thoroughly, though I haven't any time now to do so. Hopefully I will do by the weekend. Also, I noticed for formatting issues, eg under migraine the citations given for migraine action and Lupus UK are done differently than how they were done for SCENIHR. I hope we could also comb through the text to ensure that citations are done properly (ie how they were done for SCENIHR) and also ensure that when citing the punctuation goes before the citation - e.g. cited text.^[1] See

247

06:09, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

The poisoning of Chinese factory workers (Compact fluorescent lamp#Mercury poisoning of Chinese factory workers) is under the Compact fluorescent lamp#Environmental issues section, along with pollution and bulb disposal.

The Chinese aren't inanimate environmental objects, they are human beings, and would be best represented in the Health Issues section, as sufferers of CFL bulbs. Nimbow7 (talk) 02:00, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

An excellent point, and one that we shouldn't need to be reminded of. However, I think it's possible to interpret the organization of the information differently. From the point of view of a consumer, "health and safety" is the effects on the consumer's health and safety. "Environmental effects" affect health more broadly, including people, other animals, ornamental plants, and plants that are essential for the functioning of the ecosystem, and, thus, ultimately, human health.

I think I'd still agree that factory workers would be better placed in the health section--just want to point out that it's not so clear cut. --Ccrrccrr (talk) 12:47, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

A worthy note, Ccrrccrr. It seems to me that the other data within that section is exclusive of direct impact upon human health, and focused on the disposal and possible mercury pollution of the ground or air rather than ill-effects upon human factory workers. I would feel happier if it was not in the same section as possible environmental pollution and broken bulbs. Nimbow7 (talk) 00:26, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps a new section on the worldwide distaste and opposition to CFLs could be incorporated, especially since their forced introduction. There is voluminous criticism of CFL's for their light quality, design and impediment to suitable light fittings. A basis could be from here. Nimbow7 (talk) 00:38, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

I think if this could be done in a manner that's well sourced and written in a neutral point of view then there'd be no issue. However it seems more and more likely that a FL controversial/issue/or problems article needs created to address this, health concerns, and possible mercury/environment concerns as well.

247

06:00, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

In the "starting time" section, could a knowledgeable editor add a discussion of what is the technology behind the "instant-on" bulbs? Comet Tuttle (talk) 22:33, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Instant start ballasts simply apply enough voltage to strike the arc inside the tube. This wears down the electrodes and decreases the number of lamp starts. Warm start ballasts heat the electrodes for a moment (e.g. half a second) before striking the arc. This prolongs electrode lifetime and allows the lamp to be turned on and off more often. There's information at

Electronic_ballast#Fluorescent_lamp_ballasts. Totsugeki (talk

) 18:04, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Every day for the last two months I've heard about the H1N1 virus which so far has killed a handful of people in Canada (compared to the thousand or so every year who are killed by regular flu). And yet, for as long as I've been on the Wikipedia, I have yet to hear a news item about someone killed by a light bulb (strictly, by mercury from a light bulb...there was that poor fellow electrocuted when changing a ballast). Am I the only one who remembers poking his fingers into the beads of mercury from the broken thermometer, or have the rest all died of mercury poisoning? Keep it real...junk food and video games are a bigger threat to childrens' health than light bulbs. --Wtshymanski (talk) 14:43, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

I had a physics teacher who, in the 1960s, spilt half a bottle of mercury onto the lab floor demonstrating making a barometer. He had us all crawling around with sheets of paper trying to get it out of the gaps between the floorboards, so as not to waste any. Now, that may have been harmful, but I know of no ill effects to date. --Nigelj (talk) 16:22, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

And before we get another claim of boogeyman "electromagnetic fields" around a CFL, could we get some *real science* comparing this to the field around an incandescent bulb and explaining just *what* the "health eeffects" specifically are? --Wtshymanski (talk) 22:43, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

A lamp that produces no electromagnetic radiation would be quite useless. Totsugeki (talk) 17:56, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

We could just go on removing and restoring the graph comparing broken bulbs to coal emissions - that's tons of exciting fun for everyone and helps everyone roll up their all important edit counts. Or, we could *explain* why we want to remove the graph, but that's too dull and grown-up a method to be viable here on the Bickerpedia. --Wtshymanski (talk) 21:10, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

I support the graph remaining there - I appreciate having the issue so clearly illustrated. However, it does need to be updated; the original source for the figures appears to have been removed from the NEMA site, and the EPA fact sheet now uses different data, computing average mercury use per 8000 hours instead of 5 years (however many hours of usage that's supposed to be). In this table, incandescents are responsible for 5.8 mg of mercury, while CFLs are responsible for 1.2 mg from electricity use plus 0.6 mg for the bulb. Anyone feel like updating the graph? Source is here: http://www.energystar.gov/ia/partners/promotions/change_light/downloads/Fact_Sheet_Mercury.pdf Joren (talk) 21:25, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

There are a number of reasons why this image is a ridiculous contrivance:

• as is stated in the caption, the USA does not rely only on coal power, so immediately the figures are roughly 50% wrong
• power plants are going to run regardless of which light bulbs people use, and whether people use CFLs or incandescents has no direct influence on whether companies build or maintain coal power plants
• there is no requirement that incandescent lights (or CFLs or anything else) be powered by coal power plants as opposed to other methods of power generation — given power generation by hydro, nuclear, solar, or wind sources, CFL use might always disperse more mercury than incandescents

All this graph accurately conveys is that coal power plants and CFLs disperse mercury, but it does so in a way that fallaciously attributes coal power plants' (greater) dispersal of mercury to the use of incandescent light bulbs. This graph was contrived for the specific purpose of convincing people to use CFLs instead of incandescents.

Ok, so the mercury use is indirect, not direct. Surely we can include that proviso in the caption and allow readers to judge for themselves the relevance of the information? For what it's worth, I don't think the point of the graph is so much that incandescents are bad, it's more making the point that we already deal with mercury emissions greater than what CFLs produce. Of course there are perfectly valid counter arguments for that (such as the mercury in CFLs being releasable in the home if the bulb is broken); but that doesn't make the information any less interesting or relevant to the article. The way I see it,

NPOV means neutral point of view, not no point of view. It's ok to include content from both (multiple?) points of view. That's my 2 cents anyway. For now, the graph is lacking a current source, as the original source has been 404'd. It needs to be updated; why not update it yourself? You can add a caption that would ensure the data does not get misinterpreted. Joren (talk

) 14:13, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

• Some areas don't burn coal to make electricity. Some do. That's explained in the caption. And in some areas that use nearly all hydroelectric power, increasing the amount of energy available for export can displace coal-fired electricity generated elsewhere; the 70 watts not used in Manitoba can displace 70 watts of coal-fired generation in North Dakota if exported (first-order approximation, anyway).
• Are you saying the power plants run anyway and don't consume any more fuel depending on load? Why isn't my electricity free then?
• There's no requirement that any bulb runs on anything. The point of the figure is that there can be displacement of coal emissions of mercury.
• Is it not obvious that a coal plant that produced 500 kWh has emitted more mercury than a coal plant that produced 150 kWH? Is it not of interest and value to observe that the difference in mercury emissions is of the same order of magnitude as the mercury contained in the lamp? I think the figure strikingly illustrates this. The point of the figure is that the often-raised argument of mercury emissions should include the whole system, not just the bulb.
• How much mercury is used/spilled/emitted by the manufacture of incandescent bulbs, for that matter? In Edison's day, spilled mercury was a major hazard of bulb manufacture...I haven't seen anything on this yet. Where there's high-grade vacuum pumps, there's generally mercury, though. --Wtshymanski (talk) 04:17, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

"That's explained in the caption."

It had to be, because the image is otherwise utterly misleading.

"increasing the amount of energy available for export can displace coal-fired electricity generated elsewhere"

It can, but does it.

"Why isn't my electricity free then?"

Because you're willing to pay for it. This is the same reason coal power plants exist and are maintained, not because people use incandescent light bulbs.

"The point of the figure is that there can be displacement of coal emissions of mercury."

"Can" again — and if everyone switched to LEDs we wouldn't need mercury at all, but that doesn't mean coal power plants would cease to exist (not remotely).

"In Edison's day"

Last century called, it wants its relevance back.

¦

If only wit were a substitute for logic. --Wtshymanski (talk) 06:16, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

Then what I've said would make twice as much sense. :) ¦

I'm with you on keeping the picture, but please be careful when editing the talk page. In one of your edits, you overwrote replies from myself and from Reisio, which is generally not a good idea. Of course I assume good faith; it's easy to make mistakes when editing (I make them frequently enough myself). Just be careful. Joren (talk) 07:24, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

Hey Reisio, thanks for your willingness to talk about differences here. Hopefully we can all work something out rather than edit-warring. I have a simple request to make - could you please stop marking your reverts as "minor"? I understand you may be using a script that does this and might not be aware of it. To quote Help:Minor edit, "Reverting a page is not likely to be considered minor under most circumstances. When the status of a page is disputed, and particularly if an edit war is brewing, then it is better not to mark any edit as minor. Reverting blatant vandalism is an exception to this rule." Thanks, Joren (talk) 10:49, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

It is a minor edit to me. Those that are not involved in this still won't be caring, and those that are (Wtshymanski) obviously will be checking edits regardless. ¦

Your designation of that edit as minor flies in the face of Wikipedia policy. That is put there so that when someone sees the history they will know that there has been no substantive change to the article, yet the existence of an edit war over that very change demonstrates that it IS substantive. Hence the policy asking users not to mark edit wars as minor. They're not. Trying to slip in the last word with a "minor" edit and hoping no one notices is not helpful. If you want to discuss things here, great. I personally prefer LEDs over CFLs anyway. But please be a civil editor and (try) to follow community policy. Thanks, Joren (talk) 20:00, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, it was an editing glitch - if this is the biggest mistake I've made this week it will be an unusual week. Getting back to the point, I fail to understand the objection to the figure; it does show the relative magnitudes of mercury emission, and a lot of people don't know that mercury comes out of smoke stacks as well as other places, let alone the magnitude of the emissions. --Wtshymanski (talk) 15:42, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

A lot of people don't know they're supposed to imagine a fantasy world of contrived situations before looking at a graph representing fact on Wikipedia. ¦

Reisio (talk

) 19:12, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

No worries. Thanks, Joren (talk) 20:14, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

The graph seems to me a decent attempt to weigh the mercury emissions of CFLs vs incandescents - what's contrived about that? So great, if you live near solar or nuclear power, you can probably ignore that graph. The rest of us have to deal with the reality that our power is coming at a substantial cost to the environment, and reducing that power usage is generally a good thing. The thing the user has to decide is whether reduced mercury emissions (and C02, methane, sulphuric acid and everything else) is worth the tradeoff of having to dispose of (and live alongside) that mercury themselves. Most users are not aware that coal power results in mercury emissions - I certainly wasn't, and I'm glad that graph was there! Of course, my idea would be to forget CFLs, incandescents, the whole lot - just use LEDs. But in any case I am glad the graph was there and it's a good eye opener for readers to put the mercury content of CFLs in perspective. You seem to be afraid that users won't be able to tell the difference between coal and non-coal power. I think it's fair to hope that most users reading an article on CFLs will be literate enough to read the graph and the caption, and reach the conclusion for themselves, rather than deciding this information is just too unsafe for the general public to see. Again, I must state the caveat that this graph needs to be updated to reflect current sources, and you are welcome to do so if you'd like the opportunity to ensure the graph is not misrepresented. Joren (talk) 20:14, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

"The graph seems to me a decent attempt to weigh the mercury emissions of CFLs vs incandescents - what's contrived about that?"

I have already detailed this in my first reply.

"So great, if you live near solar or nuclear power, you can probably ignore that graph."

Or pretty much anywhere else. :p

"I must state the caveat that this graph needs to be updated to reflect current sources"

This is just another reason for this particular (version of this) graph to not be included.

"Marking…reverts as minor is disruptive to the community"

It seems to be getting along alright.

¦

As we debate this, we should focus on what our reliable sources are and how we want to represent what they say clearly. Looking at the source, I see that the graphic appears to be out of date. The page for the graphic says that its data is from the energy star info page [3], but the image date is earlier than the latest version posted at that URL, and the numbers don't seem to match. So I support omitting the graphic at least until it is updated. We might want to update the text as well--the info sheet is clear that the advantage of CFLs hold even considering average US electricity generation, not only if one considers coal as the only source of electric generation. Ccrrccrr (talk) 03:54, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

There is no MOTOR in a lamp starter. Please don't add that to the caption again. It's very difficult to

Agreed. Also, even if it said "starter," that's not an accurate term for an electronic ballast. The starting circuitry is integral to the ballast circuitry, not a separate item as in an old magnetic ballast arrangement.Ccrrccrr (talk) 01:59, 4 December 2009 (UTC)