low energy bulbs can increase heating bill ?

punamulta

the old incandescent bulbs get very hot producing more heat than light, this heat warms the room slightly, enough for example to often keep frost from a greenhouse, in theory at least any heat loss from cooler low energy lighting will be automatically replaced by any heating on a thermostat, virtually a zero sum game in winter??

4ndy

I agree. The only inefficincy I can see is that we are ripped off more for electricity than gas.

Energy saving is negligible as we have heating on for most the time that the lights are on. Without the slight warming effect of the bulbs in spring, autumn or late on a summer evening, we might be tempted to put the heating on. Might work in southern european countries.

Forget the low hanging fruit - find some better policies, that might actually work.

Umski

Surely a lightbulb is there to create light, the heating heat. What's the issue here? Gas (assuming you have gas heating) will be cheaper than Electricity too . If you want a small amount of heat get a radiant heater, probably more efficient than a lightbulb, which produces wasteful light :rolleyes:

Or am I missing the point?!

A_fiend_for_life

The light is on and the heating is off seems they are working fine here.

prettyinblack

The difference made to your heating through incadescent bulb use will be less than you will add by wearing a single thin extra layer.

Blackjack_Davy

I've just invested in a couple of 30W energy saving bulbs (not through choice, more due to the fact that regular incandescent bulbs are being phased out) and they're just about as hot as the old fashioned bulbs used to be! The plastic casing on the base is too hot to touch! Same goes for the glass!

So no worries on increased heating costs there, then. :cool:

punamulta

Interesting that 30w bulbs get that hot, they may be using more than the quoted wattage, I know lighting system designers have to allow over double the power loading for these bulbs as the claimed consumption is optimistic to say the least.

Cardew

punamulta wrote: »

Interesting that 30w bulbs get that hot, they may be using more than the quoted wattage, I know lighting system designers have to allow over double the power loading for these bulbs as the claimed consumption is optimistic to say the least.

Without getting too technical, that is because of the Power Factor.

Certain electrical loads can take more power(volt/amps) than watts.

However that does not matter to domestic customers as you only pay for watts.

So a 30 watt bulb could consume, say, 45 volt/amps but you will only pay for 30 watts.

However the additional power these bulbs take still has to be generated and in industrial applications steps have to be taken to mitigate the additional power.

mech_2

I would say that's a bit misleading Cardew. It makes it sound as if volt-amperes are the true amount of power used and that a 30 watt reactive load using 45VA would need 50% more energy to be supplied by the power station.

Watts are real power, volt-amperes are apparent power. All it means in efficiency terms is that to supply 30 watts at mains voltage the current in the cables is higher. The transmission losses will be higher in the cables between the power station and the bulb compared to the same wattage incandescent bulb, but the low energy bulb still only uses 30 watts of actual power.

mr_cool

Cardew wrote: »

Without getting too technical, that is because of the Power Factor.

Certain electrical loads can take more power(volt/amps) than watts.

However that does not matter to domestic customers as you only pay for watts.

So a 30 watt bulb could consume, say, 45 volt/amps but you will only pay for 30 watts.

However the additional power these bulbs take still has to be generated and in industrial applications steps have to be taken to mitigate the additional power.

I do not understand what you are trying to say. Power is watts. "45 volt/amps" the bulb uses 230v not 45v.

Cardew

mech wrote: »

I would say that's a bit misleading Cardew. It makes it sound as if volt-amperes are the true amount of power used and that a 30 watt reactive load using 45VA would need 50% more energy to be supplied by the power station.

Watts are real power, volt-amperes are apparent power. All it means in efficiency terms is that to supply 30 watts at mains voltage the current in the cables is higher. The transmission losses will be higher in the cables between the power station and the bulb compared to the same wattage incandescent bulb, but the low energy bulb still only uses 30 watts of actual power.

I knew this would happen!

I could have phrased it better! and should have quoted the whole post. I was refering to this part of the post:

I know lighting system designers have to allow over double the power loading for these bulbs

The designers would need to allow for the increased current and losses.