Nu-Lab’s campaign against ‘traditional’ light bulbs gathers pace.

Son of staring eyed Left Winger Anthony Wedgwood Benn, Hilary, Nu-Lab’s Environment Secretary, informed their conference he wanted to see sales of 150-watt bulbs banned from next January.

But of course it is not just 150 watt bulbs - He wants to take the same ‘defeat in detail’ route Nu-Lab so successfully applied with HIPs, that minimises resistance to the point where it can be ignored.

He stated "our aim is for traditional 150-watt light bulbs to be phased out by January next year, 100-watt bulbs the year after, 40-watt bulbs the year after that and all high-energy light bulbs by 2011."

This might be worthwhile if it had a reasonable chance of ‘doing what it says on the tin’, as they say.

Mr Benn claims that the ban could save five million tonnes of CO2 a year. Typically he appears to fail to take several factors into account:

Firstly he appears to fail to take into account that the heat generated by incandescent bulbs, that he is counting as wasted, actually contributes to heating the premises the bulbs are used in - and this reduction in heat will actually largely have to be made up by additional heating costs and result in increased CO2 emissions required in heating that will offset the supposed saving to be gained in introducing the bulbs.

So a lot of expense in changing all the bulbs for far less gain than touted. Then there are the disparities in production costs… All this will be coming out of the consumers pockets.

Then there is the small matter of the mercury that goes into making the ‘low energy’ bulbs. Nu-Labs Euro MPs were so concerned about the threat of mercury to the environment that they banned mercury barometers, but they seem happy turn a blind eye to the threat of a metric ton of Mercury being dumped in the UK each year that these bulbs pose.

EU Conflicted over Low energy light ‘bulbs’

The EU is mandating Low energy light bulbs.

The EU also has an import tariff of up to 60% on Chinese manufactured Low energy light bulbs. Over 80% of these bulbs sold in the EU are not made in the EU. The Commission have just voted to extend that tariff for another 12 months.

Clearly free trade enthusiasts then…

So the EU it is not really keen on all low energy light bulbs then – just those manufactured within the EU.

Environmental group Worldwide Fund for Nature don’t like the tariff and would like to see sales of the bulbs increase despite the serious environmental threat from the mercury in them.

Curious that the EU bans the sale and repair of mercury barometers on the grounds that they contain mercury, not exactly known for their environmental impact - whilst at the same time promotes these bulbs, that if taken up in huge numbers will likely prove to be a dangerous source of mercury pollution when disposed of.

EU saves us from deadly barometer threat!!

Headline: The heroic EU has saved the grateful citizens of Europe, yet again from another deadly curse of our times.

The fearsome Mercury Barometer will terrorise us no more! Thanks to The EU’s environment committee, including two British Labour MEPs, Linda McAvan and Glenis Wilmott.

After the bruising battle the Miss McAvan, a Yorkshire MEP, bluntly stated there is "clear evidence" that mercury in barometers was "highly dangerous".

A sinister conspiracy of traditional British barometer makers and restorers, backed by Liberal Democrat MEP Chris Davies, have finally been outflanked and foiled by this stalwart paragon of democracy and are now facing the closure they so richly deserve. They almost got away at the last moment, but the redoubtable, the steely eyed Lord Rooker UK minister for sustainable farming and food, managed to prevent that.

As we all know these merchants of death are single headedly responsible for the terrible swathe of death and destruction wrought by mercury barometers over the last three centuries or more. Not to mention the acres – oops! Square kilometres think I got away with that one - of land left uninhabitable.

I don't see anyone trying to ban Compact Flourescent Light bulbs. No they are promoting them as environmentally friendly! I expect McAven & Willmott will probably tell you so too.

Now compact fluorescent bulbs contain an average of 5 milligrams of mercury each, not a huge amount you might think. All CFLs will eventually need to be disposed of though - and you know they will end up in the trash and get broken.

Well some 200 million light bulbs a year are sold in the UK alone - replace them all with compact flourecent bulbs and you could end up with a Metric Ton of mercury being dumped in the UK every year.

Contrast that with the odd broken mercury barometer!

So in the great scheme of things – would it really have hurt for them to have granted an exemption?