oh no a gov't

not for long brah, this **** is going national from what I hear.

California is just an early adopter.

Yeah, I'm not referring to reliability, only the brightness, light pattern, color, etc. (the actual usefulness of the light itself). Personally, I've got a major boner for LEDs and own several expensive LED flashlights and love them to death....but I sure wouldn't want my entire house to be lit by them.

same happened here in the UK a few years ago.

The dumb thing is, new lightbulbs contain crap loads of mercury, so they may use 1/6th of the energy and less co2 etc etc, but good luck cleaning up the nasty chemicals. Its not much better really.

if(getThingFlags(source) & 0x8){
  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

Welcome to the dimly lit future.

The state already has. And as for the second part, you're not the only person who buys power. Other people do to as well, and the demand gets so high in the summer time, that we have these things called rolling brown outs. I'm sure you've experienced them. Regulated the wattage of light bulbs reduces the strain on the grid, reducing brownouts and black outs and saving people money on their utility bills to boot.

So, unless you have your own solar system on your house to generate your own power to do with as you please, quit being a selfish douche wad and get over it. There are plenty of alternatives out there that aren't CFLs that will provide the light you want fine. In fact, if you spent as much energy lookin for them instead of *****ing about this, you'd probably have managed to find these alternatives by now.

Do you think this law has a provision that if you produce your own power you can use it how you like? As you say, if I have a turbine and a few solar panels running my house, COULD I buy a 100 watt incandescent bulb?

You try manufacturing 100w lightbulbs for 20 people. Tell me how that goes.

Maybe you should replace the "could I" with "would I be allowed to" and think about it again.

Who lotta people raging against the machine with no evidence in here.
http://www.snopes.com/medical/toxins/cfl.asp
I don't know about you guys, but I don't break too many light bulbs.

That's one of the biggest problems with our state -- instead of correcting the problem, they put a band-aid on it. Instead of "Hey, let's fix the infrastructure!" we get "Hey, let's make a lot of dumb rules!"

We've seen this with university education, roads and highways, and now w'ere getting it in our lightbulbs.

The bandaids would be okay if they weren't so difficult and time consuming to remove.

I just want to point out that countries across the world are doing this. INCLUDING THE REST OF THE STATES IN YOURS. Actually, those other countries are entirely phasing out incandescent light bulbs, whereas the US simply has minimum efficiency standards.

LEDs (and other things less ridiculous than CFLs) are rapidly making advances and I propose it won't be too long before there are lamps (that you can afford) that have a satisfying color temperature, brightness, and lighting pattern for home use.

Because I dislike the lack of actual discussion in this thread I'm just going to bring up hitler right now and end it.

I was being slightly sarcastic lol

I just barely made the Texas connection...

@ spook lol

Don't forget the pain when they've been on for too long.

****ing cloth bandaids, leave my skin on me!

Cloth bandaids are the best, the others always fall off

This is bull****, when I pay for power, I expect them to fulfill their end of the deal and have the capability to generate it for me. Of course there are plenty of alternatives out there that will give me the light I want, and most of them use just as much energy so quit wasting tax dollars with stupid little bans for this and that that make me feel like I'm living in China. It does nothing to fix the problem, which is dirty power PRODUCTION. Instead of placing the burden on our backs by making us buy and use piece of **** light bulbs, grow some balls and start building nuclear power plants or something. And by the way if they really saved the public money, do you think they would even have to legislate this? There's a reason the free market isn't making these new "cheaper" bulbs mainstream, and that's because they are thus far expensive piles of crap that are inferior in every way.

And I fully admit to being a selfish douche wad. I consider it my civic duty.

are you a republican

I've purchased, in the past six or so years, about 12 CFL bulbs, which have replaced nearly every old incandescent bulb in the house. Aside from one that got bumped out of a ceiling fixture and broke, I've never had to replace any of them. That said, I will miss 100 watt, since they were usually a lot brighter than 60 watt and that just makes things look so much nicer.

-Anyways, quit your *****in' and go Halogen, man.

It wasn't the power companies who lobbied for this, you know. It was the lightbulb manufacturers.

Except for reliability, safety (much cooler), longevity. Legislation issues aside I swear you must be buying the worst possible CFLs all the ones I use are just fine.

My grandmother hates CFLs, and her arguments aren't much better than yours...

As someone already pointed out, the amount of mercury in a CFL is so minute that you could probably EAT a CFL bulb and not die from mercury (but probably glass).

Second, so don't get a CFL! Get a LED bulb instead... They use even less energy, and you can get them in incandescent styles and colors.

How is LED lightbulb technology these days? Could I buy an LED bulb from the store that is as good as a regular incandescent bulb?

The problem is that it's not just lightbulbs and its not just hippies. CARB (California air resources board) was put in charge of finding a way to implement CA AB32, the global warming initiative, and they are nearly unchecked in what they are allowed to impose. The ban on 100 watt bulbs is part of that. The whole thing is a joke. And yes I'm sorry but it really really is.
They "green jobs" that were supposed to come as a result of the legislation will likely not even make up for the jobs LOST because of it. If the green jobs even materialize at all. As it is one of the largest manufactures of solar panels just recently moved OUT of California taking over 600 of those promised green jobs with them. In the meantime companies and individuals are taking huge financial hits NOW, lots of whom are not able to afford it and simply go under.

I was in home depot a couple of days ago and and their LED bulbs were all between 20 and 40 bucks (each). They looked pretty cool but they specifically stated on the box that they were not for use outdoors and not for use in enclosed fixtures and should be installed pointing down. I'd have a hard time spending 20 bucks on a light bulb.

CARB is a huge turd pile. I have many had nothing but headaches with them for a business I help my father run. It's gotten so stupid dealing with them that we gave up and are working with the Mexico City Transit Authority. The MEXICAN GOVERNMENT is easier to work with than goddamn CARB.

Quite true. The power grid isn't designed to handled to number of people drawing from it now. Frankly, they're lucky that people and businesses are buying into the solar craze right now and generating their own power and even putting power into the grid.

However, getting new power plants built is difficult because the public doesn't want them in their backyards because they're ugly and the cheapest power plants are the biggest polluters. So, until the public gets their heads out of their asses about aesthetics and cost, we're totally screwed, at least in California.

It's safe to say that my power comes from a public venture.

Yes. All (OK maybe most) laws and regulations should have a sunset clause and require renewal every x number of years, so if it's ineffective or obsolete it can be re-evaluated and is no longer a burden on society. For example the no using cell phones/electronic devices when driving which is laughable in it's uselessness at lowering the number of accidents.

Just for the record, the utility company in question that I am a customer of is Pacific Gas and Electric.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Gas_and_Electric_Company

Publicly traded on the NYSE and all.

It increases them. Now the teenagers hold the phone lower while texting, so they see the road even less.

In California I can get a ticket for looking at my phone to check the time. I don't see how that is any different from turning on my defroster, putting a CD in a CD player, putting a cassette in a tape player, putting in an 8-track tape, tuning an old AM dial, etc etc etc. Not to mention talking to a car full of people if you aren't alone. We aren't doing anything differently than we were 50 years ago. ****ing idiots just started blaming cell phones for the ****ty driving that has always existed because they are such easy targets, and politicians who want to get re-elected gave the idiots what they wanted and now those of us with half a brain have to live with nonsense bans. Same goes for fast food, gun control, violent video games, marijuana, you name it.

[I know, I know, welcome to real life, thats the way it is. I'm still gonna ***** about it.]

We need a society where we're not governed by and subject to the rules of stupid old people who don't have a clue.

You're a complete idiot if you think the driving was worse 50 years ago than it is when someone is constantly texting away on their cell phone. Granted, there are more cars now on over clogged roads, highways and freeways that amplify the problem, but someone texting can not be compared to changing the radio station or turning on a rear defroster because those things only take a fraction of a second to do while opening a text reading it and then responding to it will take several seconds or more.

All the near-accidents on the roads I experienced involved another driver fiddling with their cell phones. I'm sorry but I can't see how texting can't be anything other than a problematic distraction while driving. There are bad drivers on the roads, and when they fooling around with cell phones, they become even worse drivers.

Idiots.

I've had plenty of close calls with people who weren't on cell phones. If you have a close call, and somebody is on the phone, you'd be foolish to instantly blame the fact that they were on the phone. Correlation does not imply causality, but you knew that, right?



You're a complete idiot if you think I said anything about texting. It's different from just talking. And you can't tell if somebody is texting anyway, it's completely unenforceable. There is no evidence that hands free laws do anything to reduce accidents.

i dont see why you would even need to do that. i dont think i've seen a car manufactured in the last 20 years that doesnt have a clock in it...

its possible they exist, but i dont think they are all that common anymore.

I have a car with no clock in it. But that's not the point.

And while we're at it, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (CARB isn't enough for us in the Bay Area) has declared tomorrow a winter spare the air day. That mean's it's illegal to burn wood or anything else in your fireplace and they will drive around looking for smoke in chimneys and warning/ticketing people who do not comply. I hope I can get the hell out of here soon.