The puzzle of light

Artificial light has a long history from the first fire and torches 400.000 B.C., to primitive lamps that burned animal or vegetable fats in 13.000 B.C., to candles (400 A.D.) and gas lights (1792) to the first electric powered arc light (1809) to the first gas filled lights (1913) bulbs. Development have however not stopped since the beginning of the previous century and since then we had two remarkable inventions that I would like to discuss here. First of all the Compact Fluorescent Energy Saving Lamp, more commonly known as the energy saving light bulb, which was introduced by Philips in 1980. Secondly I want to talk about the Light Emitting Diode or commonly known as LED invented by General Electrics in 1962.

One of the main goals of both types of light are to reduce energy consumption (besides expanding life spam, adjusting colours etc.). The puzzle which I would like to investigate comes down to the following.

Why the reduction in electricity followed by the introduction of both new light types is not equivalent to the factual reduction that we see in practice?

There must be several mechanisms in place that lead to a so called rebound effect levelling out part of the energy reduction. In this first assignment I will try to shine a light on the above effect with the introduction of both light types.

Compared to the incandescent light bulbs (old light bulbs) the energy saving lamp offered many advantages. First of all it uses only 1/3rd to 1/5th of the energy the conventional light bulbs use, whilst having a life spam that is 8 to 10 times longer. However during the first decade the energy saving lamp had a slow start due to the fact that they were expensive, 25$-35$ per lamp and bulky, which made them unsuitable for many fixtures. Furthermore they were known for their low light output and inconsistent performance, i.e. they took time to reach their optimal light generation. However since then many improvements have been made and the old problems have been solved. As the traditional light bulb is phased out the energy saving lamp took over its position. You might expect that the total amount of energy saved would be equal to the increased energy efficiency of the new type of light bulb, however this is not the case. The total amount of energy saved is smaller than the total increase in energy efficiency. So how can this happen?

There are four possible explanation:
1. People start installing lights with higher luminosity in the same fixtures
2. People use their lights for a longer period of time
3. People increase the total amount of lights in their home
4. The overall income increased and therefore the relative price of electricity became less important 

The first mechanism leads to a partial levelling out of the energy saving as instead of a 20 watt energy saving light bulb that would have equalled the 80 watts old bulb, they put in a 30 watt bulb that equals 120 watts.

The second mechanism could also be a factor as people for instance feel less inclined to turn the light off, due to the fact that it will costs them less money anyway than the old bulb, but also due to the slow starting energy saving bulb.

The third mechanism is relevant as well  plays as with the introduction of the energy saving light bulb people on a large scale started lighting their gardens at night for instance, a practice that did not exist before.

The fourth mechanism refers to a general increase in income and, which therefore decreases the importance attached to the price of electricity as it became a smaller percentage of their total income. Furthermore due to this higher income people now live in larger dwellings than they did 50 years ago and therefore have more lights installed etc. relating back to mechanism three.

Interestingly enough the world of lights currently is rapidly changing again to another lighting technology that actually outdates the energy saving light as it was invented in 1962 by General Electric and is called Light-Emitting Diode (LED). It can already be seen that the massive introduction of LED leads to very similar events as during the introduction of the energy saving light bulb. People are replacing their old light bulbs with LED versions. This again leads to the three mechanisms being re-instated. Because LEDs are much more practical in size they can be applied in all sorts of new appliances. They appear in closets, as Ambilight in TVs, in clothes, etc. All applications that before were unheard off, leading to a reduction in energy use that is lower than the expected reduction based on just replacement. Therefore it can be said that although big strides are being made in increasing the energy efficiency of artificial light, part of this gain is being undone due to four mechanisms explained above leading to a rebound effect of 20%. This however still leaves us with 80% gain. 


http://www.philips.com/about/company/history/keyinventions/index.page http://energy.gov/articles/history-light-bulb http://energy.gov/articles/history-light-bulb http://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/fisisi/s32014.html http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2012/08/energy-efficiency-and-the-rebound-effect-neither-big-nor-bad http://www.aceee.org/white-paper/rebound-effect-large-or-small http://www.lse.ac.uk/GranthamInstitute/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/DemLigEEEP2012.pdf http://www.mts.net/~william5/history/hol.htm

The business of business is to increase its profits

I would say that if this would be the sole purpose of a business it could be very profitable on the short term, but the long term survival of the company could be under threat. For instance sometimes you have to accept lower profits for a period of time in order to invest in new opportunities to keep the business going. For instance if you are a mining company and only want to increase the profit every year then when would you invest in a new mine or invest in new products or processes in order to stay ahead of competitors? If you look at the clothing industries in Bangladesh their main goal is to increase profits where the western companies who produce their clothes in Bangladesh are the ones with the biggest profit. The further you go down the chain the smaller the profit margins get. However this branch of industry can hardly be sustained on the long run, at least in Bangladesh, as due to the sole focus on profit, worker conditions were of secondary importance. This led to the collapse of a factory (Rana Plaza in April 2013) where hundreds of workers were killed. Currently many things are changing in the Bangladesh clothing sector leading to more obscure sweat shops that are subcontracted by the bigger factories. Factories that want to do well have to close their doors due to regulations that lead to extremely high costs while western companies try to take some responsibility, but do not want to give up their high profit margins and even consider moving to Africa (like H&M CEO said one month after the collapse of Rana Plaza). So in the end the large companies will survive unless consumers also take their responsibility and demand better working conditions etc. with higher profits each time. However all the lower tier industries will be built and experience rapid growth until it literally collapses. A philosophy that only focusses on the financial part of capitalism, but forgets the human and natural aspect will in the end only lead to more and more destruction until there is nothing more to destroy as all resources will be depleted or polluted.

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/business/global-markets/2013/05/21/379080/HandM-considering.htm

http://world.time.com/2013/04/26/dying-for-some-new-clothes-the-tragedy-of-rana-plaza/

http://www.npo.nl/jeroen-pauw-in-bangladesh/05-09-2014/14act0905Jeroen