So who's paying for this bit of ecobollox ... ?

[Arfa Daily]

I was in Dunelm today. By the checkouts, were rack upon rack of those little pieces of the devil's work known as CFLs. A large sign at each rack proclaimed "11W CFL 99p each or 5 for 50p".

My immediate thought was that some little work experience erk had got this wrong, and it should have read "or 5 for 50p *each* ". But no, it was correct. Buy one for 99p. Buy five for 10p each. Now I can accept that at

99p each, costs of manufacture, shipping, distribution, and everyone making their cut, might juuuusssst about work, but at 10p, we're talking plain ludicrous. I'm pretty sure that even if these things are being slave-made in China by the million, 10p is only going to cover the costs of the materials, manufacturing process, and maybe first point shipping. Clearly, the whole thing is a scam to get people buying these hateful devices, as the ban on some types of incandescent lamps doesn't seem to have done the trick.

Obviously, there is some heavy duty subsidisation going on here somewhere. I think we can be reasonably certain that Dunelm and their suppliers are not going to be losing out on their profits, so at what point in the chain is this subsidy being injected, and by whom ?

The primary suspects would have to be either our government, or some faceless eurobollox department in Brussels, but where is the money coming from ? Out of our taxes ?

Arfa

[Bill Wright]

Yes. The true cost of environmentalism is being hidden from the public. Elements are fuel tax, the proposed taxes on new cars and domestic heating, subsidised domestic insulation, subsidised CFLs, and more.

Bill

[terry]

Gee thanks for the reminder to go out here (Eastern Canada) and buy a couple of hundred incandescent bulbs which should last the next few years. e don't replace very many annually anyway and in any case the incandescents comprise part of the home heating of this all electric house!

At around one dollar Canadian per package of four. That's about 25 cents each. They come in 40, 60 and 100 watts. Six of the 40s (6 x 40 =3D 240 watts), for example, keep our bathroom quite warm, if left on, so that only in the coldest weather does the 500 watt electric baseboard heater need to cut in at all!

Since 90%+ of our electricity is hydro generated we understand that being all-electric is a fairly 'green' way to be?

[mark]

They are subsidised by the Energy companies. I bought some Phillips branded ones, 5/50p, 'In partnership with British Gas'. Presumably the government is using some form of persuasion on these companies. Can't see them doing it out of pure altruism .

mark

[Andrew Gabriel]

Being paid for by Gas and Electricity suppliers, forced on them by the government, so you are paying for them in your gas and electricity bills.

There is no other source of money.

I have a cupboard half full of the things which have come free in the post, or similar. They're all far too low power to be useful. If they were 23-25W, then I could use them as 100W lamp replacements. I don't think there's anything over 11W.

[Cicero]

================================================

Similar offer currently in B&Q - Phillips - 5 for 39p.

Cic.

[The Medway Handyman]

Conspiracy theory - foil hats on lads.

The Greenies clearly want us to live in mud huts without any power. These

11w lamps are so we get used to the light of candles gradually.

By introducing bus lanes, speed cameras, speed bumps, cycle lanes etc they are attempting to get us used to travelling at the same speed as a horse drawn vehicle.

Starting to make sense innit?

[Tim W]

Arfa Daily wibbled on Tuesday 27 October 2009 01:03

Bet you they are some cheap crap that will die in a month thus buggering up the enviroment even more... Has been my experience of similar cheap s**te from Tescos.

[Tim W]

The Medway Handyman wibbled on Tuesday 27 October 2009 08:28

Be carbon neutral - burn an environmentalist.

[mark]

Mine are Phillips brand. Made in P.R.C.

mark

[The Natural Philosopher]

candles produce lots of CO2.

Yup!

>

[Tim W]

The Natural Philosopher wibbled on Tuesday 27 October 2009 08:54

But if you make them by stuffing a wick down the throat of a little bird, they are technically CO2 neutral.

[Arfa Daily]

So there we have it. Lots of responses in 12 hours, and not a single one seems to be in favour of these dreadful things, so why are we all sitting on our arses, and just accepting all this ecobollox, and the crap that they are foisting on us as a result of the twisted 'science' that is man-made global warming' ? What has happened to the spirit of the British people ? Has membership of the EU and the fear of ever more laws to limit what we think / say / do, completely neutered us now ?

On the speed limit thing, they have been messing with them all around our village. They have reduced some, and shifted others such that any journey in the area is now a highly frustrating exercise in speedo-watching, as the local woodentops have found somewhere to hide just around a corner from where a re-placed 30mph starts, and the local 'nothing-better-to-dos' have joined that scheme where they get loaned a speed gun, and get to point it importantly at hapless motorists as they come around the corner. I have lived here for 35 years, and there is absolutely no evidence at all that this piece of road represents any danger to anyone, nor ever has done. I have never known it to be a stretch where people do anything other than a safe 'instictive' speed, which if you try it, tends to be 30mph give or take a few mph, anyway.

But my point is that a friend of mine got nicked there a few days back. He was coasting down from the preceding 40mph limit, to the 30mph one he was entering. A copper leapt out at him as he came round the corner, and had him for 35mph. Ten yards further on, he would have been as close to 30mph as didn't matter. The copper came over to him, and patronisingly asked him if he had any idea why he had been stopped. "Now let me think ..." said my friend. "Could it be because I was SPEEDING ... ?" The copper then went on to try to get him to attend a speed rehabilitation course in exchange for a reduced fine and no points. My friend told him in no uncertain terms to stick his rehabilitation program up his arse, and to get on with writing out the ticket, as he hadn't got time to sit there all day debating whether or not he was a bad person in need of re-education.

Now *that's* the sort of stand we should all be taking against all this crap, and what we would have been doing before we all got neutered by fear of offending all these groups, or breaking laws that have been pushed through without our knowledge, to back up this process of neutering ...

Arfa

[Dave Liquorice]

Which may or may not be a problem depending on the source of the wax used to make 'em. Sourced from fossil resource (aka oil) bad as carbon that has been locked up for millions of years is released. Sourced from say bees carbon neutral as the carbon was obsorbed from the atmosphere by the plants the bees foraged on in the last year.

[Andy Dingley]

There is government pressure on electricity companies to reduce the CO2 impact of their generation.

The metric for this is written in such a way that cutting consumption counts as reducing emissions, just as much as more efficient generation would.

It's cheaper for electricity companies to hand out free CFLs than to change plant. They still gain the government credit for emission reduction.

If you hand out CFLs (or loft insulation) for free, few people want it. If you "sell" it for a trivial sum, if flies off the shelves.

In other news, expect the "Green" Thatcher re-branding soon, for closing all that mucky old industry down...

So it's largely a cost on the electricity bill, which was already imposed by legislation that our elected representatives produced, to some extent because we wanted them to.

[mark]

I think it may be due to a predicted shortfall in electricity production 'v' demand in years to come. If the government spends a few million pounds on getting us to use low energy bulbs and insulate our houses etc., then the need for new multi-billion pound power stations can be delayed for a few years. Just a theory.

mark

[Tim W]

Arfa Daily wibbled on Tuesday 27 October 2009 09:55

Technically I'm not against all CFLs. I have some "Prolight" 30W and 25W daylight ones and I'm very pleased with them. They light up like a mini sun and the colour is excellent for renovation work, including painting.

But they cost somewhat more than 99p.

Because not many people can think for themselves. Many who can made it here in a self selecting way.

It's dead. They're too busy watch on the brain sucking box.

15 years ago, I had an old Maestro, the one with the digital dash. I was doing (apparantly) 43mph along an open stretch on the A25 outide of a village but just into the 30 limit. It's a vastly open road with excellent visibility and whilst I don't condone excessive speeding, I was young and it wasn't teh worst place to be going a bit over the limit.

Anyway, mr piggy bounces out from behind a bush (literally) waving his arms and a speed gun. "Do you know how fast you were going sir?" Methinks to myself: "Crap! >40 is a fine for sure".

Him: Shows me the gun... "38"

I nearly said "Is that all?" but somehow I managed to gag that and look contrite.

He let me off, saying the Gatso down the road probably got me already. Like us locals don't know where our own cameras are...

To be fair to him, that bit of road being vastly open and straight, does attract some right pillocks doing 60+, so he was probably more after them.

It's the subtle introduction of "though crime" that's most worrying. You try to start a reasoned and balanced debate on "Is excessive immigration bad for Britain" without being instantly labelled as BNP.

[The Natural Philosopher]

WEll that is changing. Its not immigration per se, its too many people full stop. And too liberal social policies that encourage people to NOT actually work.

[The Natural Philosopher]

[The Natural Philosopher]

BUT if you buried the wax, it would be better.