To really fucking hate energy saving lightbulbs?

[DarlingDuck]

Ok I realise it is a good thing that we use them and think we should but I hate the dim flourescent glow, am starting to notice it more now the nights are drawing in and remembering just how much it does my head in.

I'm waiting to see who is profiting from it all, someone has to be getting fatter. They are completely useless, have had studies conducted about their safety with worrying results, are hugely expensive, last about a month (unless you have the old ones which are approx the size of a shoe, that ugly bastard is still hanging in the hallway a year after installation, of course), are about as much use as a candle if you don't have a manual with you when purchasing to see what kind of light they give off and the expensive ones I bought under a month ago for my bedside lamps keep popping and break at a mere shift of the lamp! Heaven forbid one smashes into your carpet....mercury in a cut toe, anyone?
TBH I think the lack of choice is what irks me most. I don't like being irked.

If you really mean that, feel free to read the advice I posted long, long ago.

I have no connection with the CFL trade and do not even own shares in Osram (but I am a member of "Which")

I just want a pair of nads on the line so we can all get pitchforks out and start a gonad BBQ hold someone responsible when it all comes out that the things dangling around our ears actually can cause brain cancer, whoops!

Just used the locator for recycling/disposal facilities. It has linked me to my Council offices, not a waste disposal site, and would be completely impractical for anyone without their own transport (and that's a whole other environmental issue, about people doing pointless car journeys to recycle a sodding light bulb).

You're quite right, Scuttle, I give in. It is far too much trouble for anybody to ever bother recycling anything. And nobody ever goes to a recycling point as part of a journey, not even when there are recycling skips outside the supermarket or in electrical shops.

Have a look at lamps made by Sylvania and Osram - we've had great results from these and they come in a range of colour temperatures so you can buy your preferred light output.

In the past we've bought lamps from supermarkets, IKEA and B&Q, but frankly have been disappointed. Our electrician recommended these and we went to an lighting shop to see what they were like. Definitely worth the effort

OP YANBU

I loathe the fuckers. I have graves disease (eye probs) and they actually make me nauseous within minutes of being on, I can see the miniscule flickering movements I swear. More often than is healthy, I go off to bed with a candle rather than endure these. They definately don't last as long as is claimed.

As a lifelong Tory, I will be delighted to vote Labour if they re-instate Mr Eddison's finest. Where do I sign?

PigletJohn have you always dated your lightbulbs then, even prior to low energy?

Mr Swan invented them before Mr Edison did.

perfume

no

when did you start dating yours?

The mercury in a CFL can be reclaimed and reused through the process of recycling. Collected lamps are crushed in a machine that uses negative pressure ventilation and a mercury absorbing filter. Therefore if you use a CFL with renewable energy and recycle it, the mercury emmission level is actually negated completely.

I agree it's hardly worth the effort to make a trip for a single lamp, but you could always keep them in a box until you have a few then do them all together

DH is completing a lighting design degree (more scientific than it sounds honest), and is doing dissertaion on lighting and ehalth implications.

We already ahd to remove all trace of these bulbs from the house due to the terrible migraines I was having, hemiplegic at one stage. We ahve encountered people who have the same experience, and people with ASD kids whose behaviur has worsened under them, and there is potential research out there about them having a negative effect on eczma.

Now obviusly I am not DH so can;t link to lots of evidence, but we;ve replaced them with halogens and so very glad we did.,

I have lifetime's supply of 100w, 60w and candle shaped old style bulbs in cupboard under the stairs.

Am now stocking up on spotlight bulbs and older style GU40 halogens in case they ban these next.

I refuse to be dictated too by Govt / EU. Replaced the central heating boiler with good old fashioned tried and tested old style Potterton boiler - the week before condensing boilers became mandatory.

My mantra - You ban it and I'll immediately buy it!

argh dictated to

OH with disposal technically shop that sold you should take them back (WEE directive) but look for the WEEE sign in windows), locally poundland does it which is easy

WA I bet I won more than you

Well, as a group my performance club owns 36000 light bulbs

so not me exactly but YKWIM

Piglet, I am very much in favour of kerbside recycling - it helps the large number of householders who don't have access to a car, or who have mobility issues to participate in appropriate recycling efforts. The point I am making is that a tiny household item that every single household now generates can only be legally disposed of (in a large city where I live) at a single point - the local Council offices - quite how this is environmentally friendly or even possible for those on without access to transport or with mobility issues I do not know.

I refuse to be dictated too by Govt / EU. Replaced the central heating boiler with good old fashioned tried and tested old style Potterton boiler - the week before condensing boilers became mandatory...My mantra - You ban it and I'll immediately buy it!

Thinking of preserving this quote to show my grandchildren why the world is the way it is!

Oh I see, a history lesson as well as a green one. Mr Eddison was the one who made the lighting available on a mass scale though, wasn't he? He ran with it, made it work, kitted out exchanges and stuff, linked folk up.

But seriously, did you start to date the bulbs lamps when you changed over to low energy to check how long they lasted? Were you sceptical of the claims of longevity?

And nobody ever goes to a recycling point as part of a journey, not even when there are recycling skips outside the supermarket or in electrical shops

Correct - which is what makes the true costs of these bulbs far higher than published.

Peachy i'm not at all surprised. I get a headache if I have my lamp on to read, although it's hard to tell if it's the low light levels or something given off by the bulb...

If someone had really thought this through rather than rushing it through parliament, you would be able to put it into the box it came in to dispose of it. But that would probably cost the fat cats making them too much to get a profit.

Maybe supermarket delivery vans could collect them? I use delivery of my shopping to save the planet so rather than me dedicating floor/shelf space to hoarding mercury filled bits of glass, it would be a preferable option. Oh I sense a Dragons Den opportunity here!

Scuttle, why don't you do what I did and email your local council to ask?

If you really care.

Orb it's stop gap: acknowledged as such in the industry

lots of research into proper methods- canada has gone back on it's ban on incandescents but has put that back a yyear due to health concerns

Apparently life span depends on temperature of use and how many timestuned off an on

Take lots of energy to produce and ispose of

Long term LED is likely to be chosen technology but it has some way to go yet

I refuse to be dictated too by Govt / EU. Replaced the central heating boiler with good old fashioned tried and tested old style Potterton boiler - the week before condensing boilers became mandatory

Our plumber reckons most of these new boilers are not very reliable vs the old Potterton steam engines, so said we should keep ours goimng for as long as we can - and the new ones can't push water through old victorian pipes as well.

Not all that is new glitters....