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Oh the power. Can you feel it?
Let’s make 1 million vehicles vanish from the face of the Earth.
It’s actually easier than you may think.
If every household in the United States would replace one incandescent light bulb with a compact fluorescent bulb (CFL), the energy saved would be the equivalent of removing the aforementioned vehicles.
Via EnergyStar.gov,
“In the United States, approximately 6.6 tons (almost 15,000 pounds carbon equivalent) of greenhouse gases are emitted per person every year. Emissions per person have increased about 3.4% between 1990 and 1997. Eighty-two percent of greenhouse gas emissions are from burning fossil fuels to generate electricity and power our cars.”
In addition to saving energy, compact fluorescent light bulbs will save you money! That’s double the benefit, why are you still reading this post and not running out to get some twisty new compact fluorescent light bulbs? [Note that you can purchase CFL’s that look like “regular” bulbs now as well…they don’t have to be the twisty kind.] Here’s an illustration of the energy and financial savings via wasteless.org,
“Bulb Types compared are a 100W Incandescent VERSUS 23W Compact Fluorescent (which is equivalent to 100W incandescent):
- Purchase Price: $0.75 | $11.00 Life of the Bulb: 750 hours | 10,000 hours
- Number of Hours Burner per Day: 4 hours | 4 hours
- Number of Bulbs Needed: About 6 over 3 years | 1 over 6.8 years
- Total Cost of Bulbs: $4.50 | $11.00
- Lumens [amount of light produced]: 1,690 | 1,500
- Total Cost of Electricity (8cents/kilowatt-hour): $35.04 | $8.06
- Your Total Cost Over 3 Years: $39.54 | $19.06″
As you can see, though it may cost you a few pennies more up front to purchase the CFL’s, replacing one incandescent with a compact fluorescent will save you 20 dollars over 3 years. Imagine what could happen if you changed all the bulbs in your home!
Given this information, why would people choose not to replace the bulbs in their home?
I think every little step toward living green is an awesome one… but eco-snobbery sucks! My goal is to help newbies learn the most important steps toward living green — individually and collectively. Personally, I strive to have as little impact as possible on Planet Earth while I'm here.
