Full Title: Abating Air Pollutions at Negative Cost Via Energy Efficiency
Author(s): Amory B. Lovins
Publisher(s): The Environmental Professional, v.12
Publication Date: January 1, 1990
Full Text: Download Resource
Description (excerpt):
A single 18-watt compact fluorescent lamp, producing the same light as a 75-watt incandescent lamp for about 13 times as long, will over its 10,000-hour nominal lifetime avoid the emission from a typical U.S. coal-fired power plant of about one tonne of CO2 and eight kilograms of SO2, plus NOx, heavy metals, and other pollutants. If the fluorescent lamp is displacing nuclear power instead, it will typically avoid producing one-half a curie of strontium-90 and cesium-137, plus approximately 25 milligrams of plutonium equivalent in explosive power to 385 kilograms of TNT.
All these calculations include distributed losses and net space-conditioning effects. Yet far from costing extra, the lamp will save about $20 worth of ordinary lamps and their installation labor, plus about $20-30 worth of utility fuel. Thus the lamp cleans the air while creating tens of dollars’ net wealth and deferring hundreds of dollars’ investment in electrical supply systems.