Letters to the Editor
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What to do with your bulbs? A: Send them to me!
Because I'm still using them, and plan to for a long time yet. In fact, I've been snatching them up at garage and estate sales. I have a pretty good supply right now that will last me a few years, but I figure I will get plenty more over time.
I also have the curly fluorescent ones -- I bought some a few years back before all the fuss about them -- and they are OK for certain applications, but unless they are drastically improved, they are not an adequate substitute for incandescent bulbs in many applications. Other posters have detailed the problems; they take forever to come on, the light is very harsh, they flicker in 'dimmer' outlets.
I think they work fine in certain areas of the home -- places that are hard to get in to change a bulb, attics or hallways. But I find them miserable for applying makeup, cooking or reading.
Some people have said "oh the ones I bought 7 years ago are working fine". Well, all compact fluorescents are not equal. The original ones were made in the US by big bulb manufacturers. Now they are all made, much more cheaply and insubtantially, in China (no surprise there).
As well as inferior light, this has decimated the US bulb industry and closed factories and sent seasoned lighting workers into unemployment. And I know -- I live in Cleveland, just down the road from former GE lighting headquarters at Nela Park. We were once the locus of bulb manufacturering AND research & testing: no more. When you buy CFLs from China, you are also putting the stake into the heart of another American business. And on the mercury issue, we are also trusting a foreign supplier who has not been especially trustworthy in other areas, such as producing safe food products -- why would we think they would care any more about mercury safety?
While lighting is an important outlay of energy dollars, quality matters too. Some folks could do a whole lot more to safe energy if they replaced their electricty guzzling appliances: you are doing nobody a favor by clinging to that old refrigerator. New ones are several times more efficient. Ditto for your washer and dryer; if you upgrade to a frontloader next time AND switch your dryer from electric to gas (if available), you will be saving time, money AND energy....probably a lot more than changing over all the bulbs in your house.
For what it's worth, yeah I still have mercury thermometers. I have rotary dial phones, too. When the apocalyse comes, I will be all set.