What Kind of Bright Idea is This, Anyway?

In December Congress passed an energy bill which bans the incandescent light bulb as an energy savings measure beginning in 2012. Right off the bat, maybe this doesn't sound like a bad idea. But then you learn that the new compact fluorescent bulbs (CFL's) contain mercury. Say what?! And there are special procedures to follow in case of breakage!

I don't know about your household, but in ours, light bulb breaks happen several times a year. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I have 4 boys still living at home. Just a couple of weeks ago Stand-Up was doing just that, I mean, standing up, when he somehow managed to knock the lamp on the end table to the floor. He turned on the light to see if it still worked and there was a mini-explosion. A closer examination of the bulb revealed a small hole at its base. And he was just standing up! Not horsing around, or anything. (Can you say rapid growth spurt--as in, doesn't know what size he is anymore?!)

So I'm reading about these new bulbs we're all going to be forced to buy, and several things give me great pause. First, when there is breakage, guess what they recommend? Open your windows to ventilate the house! You know, statistically at least of quarter of the breaks in our home are likely to occur when the outside temperature is below freezing. Exactly how are we going to conserve energy opening our windows in sub-freezing temps? To prevent problems they say to use a drop cloth when changing light bulbs! Excuse me, but we don't break light bulbs while changing them. We break them from dropping them while putting them away, from scrutinizing them in curiosity, not to mention the number one way, by knocking down lamps!! So now I'll not just have the broken glass to worry about, but mercury contamination as well!

Then there's this little gem: CFL's burn out sooner if they are turned on and off a lot, so the Energy Star people recommend leaving them on at least 15 minutes at a time! I have worked very hard to train my kids to turn off lights when they leave a room. Now I'm supposed to tell them leave them on? And are we really going to save energy if we leave all our lights on all the time? Because there's no way we're going to be able to keep track of how long a given light has been on so as to turn it off after 15 minutes.

I think this law must have been written without regard for homeschooling families who are home all day. And without regard to families that have kids! I'll be contacting my congressional representatives soon to demand that they revisit this part of the energy bill, because replacing the incandescent light bulb with mercury-containing fluorescents is just plain stupid!