Environment: CFL's Not Panacea

TORONTO, ONTARIO - An interesting report aired tonight on CBC Television's "The National" from correspondent Reg Sherren. Sherren cited research at the University of Manitoba that indicates that the purported energy savings from compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFL's) are not actually 75% in northern climates. Instead, they may be as little as 17%.

How can that be? Regular incandescent light bulbs are less efficient in large part because much of the energy that they consume does not turn into light. Instead, much of it is converted into heat. In the winter when the heat is on, this is actually a good thing--adding heat to the room, if not terribly efficiently, and thus decreasing the load on the furnace, space heater, or other heating mechanism. In the summer, it's a terrible thing, as the additional heat adds to the load placed on air conditioning units. Sherren even noted a BC Hydro study that showed that CFL's may actually add to greenhouse gas emissions in British Columbia, since while electrical use will decrease, the resulting increase in the use of fossil fuels for heating would actually cause more greenhouse gases to be emitted.

While I will give the CBC and Sherren some credit for trying to be balanced in this report (they didn't say NOT to buy CFL's, for example), this kind of reporting seems to miss the big picture it claims to pursue on several points.

First of all, CFL's last longer than incandescent bulbs, so there is a net positive to the environment right there from decreased waste and resource consumption. Second of all, even if there is only a 17% reduction in overall energy consumption instead of the 75% advertised in Winnipeg, that's still a 17% reduction. How can a 17% reduction not be a net positive? If the BC Hydro study is accurate, that's a call for retrofitting houses with better insulation and more efficient furnaces that operate on cleaner fuels, not an argument to stick with inefficient light bulbs.

Of course, if one lives in Phoenix, Arizona then all of this discussion is academic--there's no question that compact fluorescent light bulbs will offer something close to their advertised advantages. It's only in northern climates where the contribution of incandescent bulbs to heating is significant that the effects the CBC has reported on matter at all.

There's nothing wrong with revealing that the marketing on a product, including CFL's, is misleading. However, reporters have a responsibility not to similarly over-sensationalize the reality. This report probably didn't quite cross the line, but if anyone walked away from it wondering if they should be installing CFL's in Toronto, where air conditioners run in the summer, let me make it clear: Of course you should buy CFL's.