The Light Just Came On Regarding the Light Bulb Ban

I wrote previously about the silly energy bill which will ban the incandescent lightbulb from American homes in an few years and wondered how such silliness to get passed. Well, it looks like Congress had some help...from the lightbulb industry which will be replacing all those cheap bulbs with much more expensive bulbs according to this item in The Wall Street Journal:

Just like that--like flipping a switch--Congress and the president banned incandescent light bulbs last month. OK, they did not exactly ban them. But the energy bill passed by Congress and signed by President Bush sets energy-efficiency standards for light bulbs that traditional incandescent bulbs cannot meet.

The new rules phase in starting in 2012, but don't be lulled by that five-year delay. Whether it's next week or next decade, you will one day walk into a hardware store looking for a 100-watt bulb--and there won't be any. By 2014, the new efficiency standards will apply to 75-watt, 60-watt and 40-watt bulbs too.

Representatives of Philips and General Electric, two of the biggest lightbulb makers, say there's nothing to be concerned about. And Larry Lauck of the American Lighting Association says, "I think everyone's pretty happy" with the new law. But then, the lighting industry has no reason not to be: People will need light, whatever the law says--according to Randy Moorehead of Philips, there are four billion standard-size (or "medium base") light sockets in America alone.

So if you're GE or Philips or Sylvania, the demise of the plain vanilla lightbulb is less a threat than an opportunity--an opportunity, in particular, to replace a product that you can sell for 50 cents with one that sells for $3 or more.

Yes, the $3 bulb lasts longer. Yes, it cuts your electricity bill. Mr. Moorehead says that when every one of those four billion light sockets has an energy-saving bulb in it, the country will be saving $18 billion a year on its electric bill. That's $4.50 per bulb--and the bulb makers are standing by to make sure a substantial portion of those "savings" get transformed into profits for them.

Thank you, Congress. Read the rest of it here.