one.point.zero - Colin O'Brien's weblog

One of the comments I get about this site is that I point at lots of things going on elsewhere but don’t talk much about my own impact on the environment. It’s true, but telling people I cycle everywhere, that my washing machine has a AAA label or that I’m practically vegan doesn’t make for very interesting reading unless you’re a stalker.

There are, however, some steps I’ve taken that could be of interest. One of them being the quest for energy-efficient light sources after moving in to an apartment who’s only form of lighting consisted of 50 Watt GU10 halogen downlighters in every single room. The living-room alone was pulling a juicy 300 Watts.

The standard replacement for traditional screw-in filament bulbs these days are compact fluorescents (CFL) which you can find absolutely everywhere. They’ve advanced enough that many of them (the ones you pay more for, usually) have a colour temperature practically the same as Edison’s classic. The only minor annoyance still being the warm-up time, which at the current rate of improvement won’t even be noticeable soon.

This technology is also available in GU10 format so my first experiment was placing 6 of them into the living room ceiling sockets. The models I purchased were from Megaman and are available in most DIY stores (in Belgium anyway). There’s a 7 Watt and a 9 Watt model, I opted for the former with a colour temperature of 2700K (closest to the classic bulb). The light is slightly whiter but only really noticeable if you compare it to a traditional halogen in the same room, the biggest difference is that the beam is wider, so you don’t get the patterns on the wall that halogens often make. To be honest, the halogens that were there originally did give off a nicer light, but the difference is small enough compared to the positive environmental and financial impacts that we can happily live with it. The amount of light also seems equivalent to what the 50W halogens were outputting.

Next up was the small corridor between the bedroom and bathroom. As there wasn’t a need for much light there, I decided to try something different and place downlighters made up of 21 blue leds each for a total power consumption of 2 Watts. I guess you could describe the light there as “blue moonlight”. You can see where you’re going but don’t expect to read a book in there. We quite like it, especially when we have to walk through there bleary-eyed in the middle of the night. It might not work everywhere, but the walls are white and the design minimal so it all fits together quite well. I can’t recall the brand I used, but you can find similar lamps in many DIY stores too.

The bathroom was the scene of yet another experiment: cold cathode lamps (CCFL). These are actually a little less efficient than compact fluorescents. Their lifetime, on the other hand, is 50.000 hours compared to the 15.000 of a CFL (or the 1000 of a traditional bulb) and they can be turned on and off for short periods of time which is often the case in a bathroom. The ones I purchased advertise a power consumption of 5 Watts and a colour temperature of 2700K. Colour-wise, I’d say they’re closer to 3500 or 4000K, the light is neon-white, fine for a bathroom, but I wouldn’t want them anywhere else. As far as the amount of light goes, they’re each equivalent to a 20 or 25 Watt halogen, perfect for taking a shower but make sure you have extra lighting over the mirror for shaving or applying makeup.

And, last but not least, the strangest of them all: the 1W Luxeon LED. The luxeon is one of the most powerful LEDs on the market, I have one in my bike light and normal LED lamps on other bikes look like their battery is about to run out when compared to it. And yes, it’s also available in a GU10 fitting. Obviously, you’re not going to get a huge amount of light from one of these, they’ll usually be found lighting up a painting or a sculpture, but I decided to try them in my office anyway. I just need a bit of background lighting when I’m using the computer so as not to work in complete darkness. If I need more light, I have a floor lamp with a CFL in it. For that use, the luxeon does the job perfectly. The light is warm but feeble, just enough to find my way through all my rubbish to my chair or see what keys my fingers are typing on. This won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but if you tend to hack through the night behind your monitor, they might just do the trick. I haven’t seen them in many shops, but they’re available in plenty of online stores.

There you go, I hope that helped someone out there. I admit some of it is early-adopter stuff, but someone’s got to do it * cough*.

If you have questions or comments, shoot...

Thanks to all the people who’ve been endlessly forwarding me an invitation to switch off the lights tomorrow for a few minutes before 8pm in order to “create global awareness of the climate and energy situation”. You can stop now, really.

If you want to act, switch the damn things off most of the time and use low-energy bulbs when you can’t. Don’t leave your TV on standby, don’t drive you car to the corner shop, take the heating down a notch, give up on flying halfway across the world just because you can.

You know the story, but you don’t want to hear it. It’s much easier to participate in some feel-good action than actually doing something. The problem with doing something being that you have to sacrifice some of that comfort you’ve gotten so used to.

Have a good answer ready when your kids ask you why you didn’t do anything even though you knew, because that question is coming.

It’s not about going back to the stone age, just making some adjustments. We’re all guilty of not doing enough, but let’s at least do something with a bit more impact than being in the dark for 5 minutes. Every time I get that email I’m reminded of a BMW X5 I recently saw sporting a Greenpeace sticker.