4.1 The CFL and innovation
The authors wanted to select the most relevant product in energy efficient lighting and
immediately thought of the compact fluorescent lamp (CFL). CFLs use a quarter of the
amount of energy for the same unit function as a standard incandescent light bulb and have
at least a 10 times longer service life.
Figure 4: shows a typical CFL, after Philips, [http://www.eur.lighting.philips.com], (2000)
The following example of the replacement of the incandescent light bulb, with Compact
Fluorescent Lamps (CFL) was published by Weizsacher et al. (1997):
The Global market currently consumes 10.000 million incandescent light bulbs per year.
200 million CFL were sold in 1994 and the figures are steadily rising by 15-20 % each year.
These light bulbs last 10 times longer, which means that they are effectively replacing 2000
million incandescent light bulbs. The replacement of one 75W with an 18W compact
fluorescent can, over its lifetime, save: at least energy value of 200 litres of oil for oil fired
electricity production.
From studying the development of lamp technologies the authors found there were many
environmentally relevant innovations in ordinary fluorescent tube lamps. CFLs were often
secondary adopters of technologies such as the improved phosphors and high frequency
dimmable ballasts. For these reasons conventional fluorescent tube lighting was chosen as
the product for the rest of this study.