Re: Gore brainwashing world to ban the light bulb!
- From: Dirk Munk <munk@xxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 01 Apr 2007 21:25:24 +0200
Paul Anderson wrote:
In article <4602ca9a$0$8753$ed2619ec@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
"John Wallace" <johnwallace4@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I put 1 kilowatt of electric power into a light, any kind of light, tungsten, carbon arc, CFL, I get 1 kilowatt of heat in the room. Efficiency 100%.
Isn't some of the energy used to make light? Or is it less than .5% and you are rounding up?
I put gas or heating oil, at a rate equivalent to 1 kilowatts input power, into a typical central heating boiler (you call them "furnaces"?) and a good part of the power input goes up the chimney (flue?). Efficiency maybe 40-70% depending on various factors (though modern condensing boilers allegedly do rather better than 90%).
Depends what you call modern. These condensing gas boilers have been standard over here in Holland for some 15 years now. I will replace mine in a couple of months, because burner technology has improved so much that it will also improve the overall efficiency. The latest developments are that a Stirling engine with an electric generator will be added to the boiler, so that even that last bit of energy will be extracted from the gas. It will produce about 1kW. Doesn't seem much, but it will mean a significant production of electricity because there are so many boilers.
Thos fluorescent light bulbs have been around for some 20 years now, at least here in Europe.
Nice anecdote:
A few years after they were introduced I went on holiday to Bonaire (Caribbean, Netherlands Antilles). I stayed in a resort with some 25 cabins, and guests from all over the world. One of them came from the Detroit area, and had a company that installed production lines in the car industry. He looked at those light bulbs, and asked what they were. The owner explained, and then the guy asked informed about the generator that was used to power the resort. The owner told him that he used one 3.5 kW generator to power the whole resort. The American guy was totaly amazed, and said to his wife: "Did you hear that, he's using a 3.5 kW generator to power the whole resort. The generator in our motorhome has the same output!!"
.
The electric light/heater is more efficient than gas or oil, on that basis, because all the energy goes into heating the room rather than some of it getting wasted up the chimney.
Why, then, is heating your house with electric heat more expensive than heating it with a furnace that uses oil or gas? I thought it was due to the inefficiency of the electric heater, but maybe it's due to the cost of electricity compared to oil or gas.
Paul
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