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<li>they’re 90% inefficient, but their inefficient waste goes out as heat. But when are light bulbs really used? At night. And during the vast majority of the season, in most homes (in the US at least), the house would otherwise need heating during night (although most of the lights are used pre-midnight, when temperature aren’t as cool as they are post-midnight). So the result of this is that this extra heat makes heaters have to work less hard, which in turn, helps reduce the energy used in heating. So I’d wager that MOST of the time, the waste heat actually isn’t wasted. Only during certain summer nights will this heat be extraneous and burdensome.</li>
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<p>Yes, most offices have lights open during the daytime, but those lights are mostly fluorescent.</p>
<p>On another environmental topic, might paper be “good” for the environment?</p>
<p>As long as timber companies are reasonably regulated (e.g. in the US), they must grow their own trees. And the trees have to grow a certain height before being cut down. As they grow (before their growth asymptotes), they sequester CO2. If you let the trees live to a ripe old age, the trees will eventually stop growing and stop sequestering CO2. </p>
<p>So cut the trees down when their growth rates start to asymptote (which is also most efficient for timber companies), and then grow new trees in their place. This helps maximize the amount of CO2 sequestered. And the CO2 will stay sequestered as long as the waste paper isn’t incinerated. </p>
<p>Plus, the main environmental threats are from urbanization, not from timber companies (which have reason to PREVENT cities from expanding into forest areas). So if you want to absorb and sequester the maximum amount of CO2 for the air, buy paper and stop conserving it. Just make sure that it comes from the US and not from Russia or the Amazon.</p>
<p>“good” meaning “counteracts global warming”. which is what most people equate with the “environment”, even though the environment doesn’t care about a warmer earth (only ppl do) cuz life still flourished in the warm world of the dinos</p>
<p>If the house is being heated by electric heat, then yes, incandescent bulbs are efficient and actually slightly environmentally friendlier because they don’t have the nasties that florescents do.</p>
<p>If the house had (say) natural gas heating, then you would have to factor the source of the electricity. Unless the electricity came from a clean source, most of the time an in-house natural gas would be greener (than electricity from natural gas or coal)</p>
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<p>They are, because nearly all of the “wasted” energy from a bulb comes off as heat. An incandescent bulb and electric heater are nearly identical except that one has the side effect of throwing off light.</p>
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<p>A good idea in principle but the details might be sticky. IIRC, most CO2 is pulled out of the atmosphere by the oceans (algae, etc). A managed timber forest, while certainly helping, isn’t going to pull a lot of CO2 by comparison.</p>
<p>Also, most non-recycled waste paper ends up incinerated or in landfills, which either way is not good environmentally. The little bit of carbon sequestered in a landfill is probably not worth the tradeoff of not recycling.</p>
<p>Among the most efficient electrical devices is the electric space heater. Some 99% of the electrical energy consumed is returned as heat (with the aid of a small fan which circulates the heat into a room). These space heaters usually come with two heat settings (750/1500 watts). </p>
<p>Using your light bulb analogy, 10% of the consumed electricity is emitted as visible light and 90% as heat. This translates (rounding up) to nine 100 watt light bulbs to get 750 watts of heat and seventeen 100 watt bulbs to achieve 1500 watts of heat. For anyone having any experience with space heaters in a cool or cold room, even 1500 watts of heat pales in comparison with a 100,000+ BTU gas fired furnace. </p>
<p>Keeping a couple of 100 watt lights burning in a room which equals 180 watts of “warmth” is unlikely to raise a room’s temperature by even a degree. You might make a case for running a hair dryer (at least that has a small fan). But seriously, running a hair dryer to heat a room is not a choice many people would make. And the relatively little heat that the light bulbs give off will rise to the ceiling. Setting your room temperature to 68 degrees and running a couple of 100 watt light bulbs to save energy is a study in futility. To get the benefits of even 750 watts of heat from a space heater (which has a much higher efficiency rating) you would have to turn on nine lamps to raise the temperature by a couple of degrees. Of course, no lights on… no heat. And this is just for only one room. </p>
<p>As for your buy paper, tree farming and decreasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, you might have a point if greenhouse gases “hovered” over well managed tree farms in North America. Unfortunately, greenhouse gases including CO2 are lofted into the air by winds. Wind currents carry these greenhouse gases around the planet (frequently bypassing your well managed tree farms). Well managed tree farms in North America do little to mitigate clear cutting in the Amazon basin or coal firing power plants, both here and abroad.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies everyone! It’s quite interesting.</p>
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<p>Okay, well, my idea was just that the additional heat from the lightbulbs would slightly decrease the amount of watts needed for heating up the room, so it all balances out (i.e. one doesn’t need to feel guilty over using incandescents in winter if one is environmentally inclined). It’s a good point that two light bulbs wouldnt make that much of a difference. </p>
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<p>Okay, well, CO2 pretty much “tries” to achieve a stable distribution in the atmosphere. The CO2 in one area doesn’t have a significantly different concentration from the CO2 in another area. The trees will take away localized amounts of CO2, and then some CO2 from surrounding areas will diffuse into the region where CO2 was lost. </p>
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<p>Good point; not much CO2 can be taken away (as of now). But oceans cannot handle so much CO2 - all of this CO2 is causing the oceans to acidify, which has all sorts of negative consequences.</p>