It’s true- by changing out your incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescents we really can change the world. I’ve been a big believer in CFLs for about 2 years now – I even gave away over 50 CFLs for birthday and Christmas presents last year. But after hearing a few complaints about them I figured I could offer up some advice – since the lighting in our home is over 85% compact fluorescent.

The key to being a happy consumer of compact fluorescent bulbs – is finding a good brand. People don’t intentionally want to ruin the Earth, but they can be turned off to CFLs by a bad first experience. The largest sources of bad impressions of these bulbs is the warm up time, color spectrum, and the milliseconds of delay when you flip the switch. Each manufacturer can have differing amounts of warm up time, electronic ballast delay, and color temperature, but finding a good quality CFL isn’t too hard.
Sadly, the retailer that is the largest vocal supporter of CFLs (WALMART) sells in my opinion one of the worst brands – GE. GE compact spiral fluorescents have a long delay, and slight warm up time (1-2 minutes) – by warm up I mean the time it takes from when you flip the switch for the light to reach full brightness. These bulbs are generally not ideal for replacements for your common incandescents, but if you find yourself in possession of one of these bulbs, don’t worry – they have their place as well. Place a slow warm up bulb in the bathroom you use to get ready in the morning. The long warm up time of these bulbs can greatly reduce eye strain in the morning. I do not recommend using a slow warm-up bulb in a security situation, like a porch light — when you flip that switch you want it to come on with full brightness instantly.

The second problem, electronic ballast delay is an annoying problem some CFL manufacturers have. The first time someone experiences any delay in the immediacy of the light it can be an awkward experience, and you’ll come to realize the instant gratification incandescent bulbs offer you. This is actually an undesired quality – so avoid these bulbs if you can. If you find yourself with one, use it in combination with a fast electronic ballast CFL. That way you’ll get some light immediately, and after the 1/30th of a second or so the second bulb will come on. They’re fine for extra lighting, always-on lights, or your bedside lamp, but not ideal for any place where guests will see it come on – (people tend to think there’s something wrong with your wiring when the light doesn’t come on instantly).

Color spectrum is kind of a personal preference. Indoors I prefer a little warmer, more yellow light, or somewhere in the middle of the spectrum. Fluorescent lighting has a history of being a harsh work-light environment, but I find most CFLs adjust for this and give a generally pleasing light.

My favorite brand is ironically the cheapest I’ve found. The brand name is n:vision, which is sold at Home Depot (green packaging) and comes in a 6 CFL pack of equivalent to 60 watt bulbs for about $10. These bulbs are near instant-on, and are at over 85% their full brightness when turned on. I’ve been very pleased with their bulbs.

The majority of the brands on the market have a 6-9 yr lifetime, run on avg about 14 watts for the equivalent lumens of a 60 watt incandescent. LESS than 1/3rd the energy, which equates to a big savings over the expected life of the bulb (about $30 savings per bulb). The cost up front is of course much greater than that of incandescents, but I think it’s worth it.

By changing out just the primary lighting of your home with CFLs you can reach a significant amount of savings in lighting costs.

Take special note of the disposal requirements for CFLs — they need to be disposed of properly. Most recycling centers will accept CFLs, and most packages include sources for more information on proper disposal.

Here’s a run down of our CFL usage in the prime living spaces of our home.
CFLs:
2 Office
4 Master BR
4 Master Bath
2 Guest BR
1 Kitchen
5 Dining Rm
6 Living Rm
6 Downstairs
1 Utility Closet
5 Porch Lights
3 Garage
=39

Incandescents:
2 Hallway
1 Garage
3 Guest Bath
=6

The spaces where we occupy our most time are filled with CFLs.

I just finished reading robert hoekman, jr.’s book, ‘Designing The Obvious – A Common Sense Approach to Web Application Design.’

While browsing the local bookstore I spotted a book which looked like one of those O’Reilly pocket references titled “Designing The Obvious.” I flipped through the contents and saw reference to quite a few noteworthy newer web applications and decided to fork over the $35 for the book. [Good decision]

I finished the book in about 3 days, and the book is an excellent read. Through helpful suggestions, Hoekman offers no nonsense approaches to web design for successful user friendly applications. One thing I found very interesting is all of the references to Japanese manufacturing assembly line techniques. If you’ve read “The Toyota Way” then you’ll know many of the terms Hoekman applies to web applications. Using Kaizen, poke-yoke, 5S… to focus your development for ease of use applications.

After reading this book it made me want to jump in to action redesigning some of our web applications, or at least make small improvements to their interfaces. If you develop any front end portions of web based applications, you should seriously get this book. I’d let you borrow my copy, but it’s already out on loan to alvin.

A new album soon, and I can’t wait.