The EU bid farewell to the "Edison era" a total ban on the sale of incandescent lamp

August 31, 2012 is the deadline for the EU total ban on the sale of incandescent bulbs. From September 1st Brussels visited several large supermarkets and appliance store shelves, lamps before the display of low wattage (40 watts) incandescent lamp has completely disappeared, instead of a variety of new energy-saving lamps.

The comprehensive ban of incandescent bulbs marks the official farewell has lasted more than 100 years of the Edison era "". As early as March 2007, the European Commission proposed a policy proposal to phase out incandescent light by the end of 2012. In March 2009, the European Commission formally passed a decree to phase out incandescent light. The law put forward specific planning stages to ban incandescent lamp: from September 1, 2009 onwards banned the sale of more than 100 watt incandescent bulbs, since September 1, 2010 more than 75 watt incandescent bulbs must withdraw from the market, since September 1, 2011 more than 60 watt incandescent bulbs may not be listed, lock 40 and 25 Watt incandescent bulbs from September 1, 2012. With September 1, 2012 coming, the traditional incandescent bulbs officially come to an end in the EU, completely out of the EU market.

Related experiments show that the incandescent bulb in the work of only 5% of the electricity can be used for lighting, and the remaining 95% of the electricity can be converted into heat wasted, so it is inevitable to be eliminated. The EU ban on incandescent bulbs is mainly to save energy and reduce carbon dioxide emissions. The relevant research results show that if the energy-saving light bulbs using the current EU Member States all converted into energy-saving incandescent bulbs with higher efficiency, the annual savings of electricity can be used in Romania for a year, and at least a year can reduce 15 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions. EU Member States, such as the full implementation of the use of energy-saving lamps, by the end of 2020 will save electricity 80 billion kwh. According to the European Commission estimates that the elimination of incandescent bulbs this measure can be reduced to 50 euros per household per EU spending, the EU can save up to $10 billion. The EU banned incandescent bulbs is decided at the beginning of the implementation led to some questioning, but environmental organizations and consumer protection organizations of the EU this practice fully affirmed that the overall effect of the EU ban incandescent lamp is positive, incandescent lamp out of high energy consumption helps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and protect the environment.

Incandescent delisting means the expansion of new energy-saving lamp market. Today, in the European Union's numerous energy-saving lamps, LED lights (ie, light-emitting diode lamps) and energy-saving lamps (ie compact fluorescent lamp) has become a cost-effective two main lighting tools.

With the exit of incandescent bulbs, energy-saving lamps will soon occupy a large share of the EU market. At present, consumers in the EU market is the largest choice of energy-saving lamps. The European Union's energy-saving lamp light energy conversion rate can be more than 50%, long service life, the price is higher than incandescent bulbs, but less than LED. However, there are some defects in energy-saving lamps, just when the light is low luminous efficiency, lighting is not as good as incandescent bulbs or LED lights. The biggest defect of energy saving lamp is trace mercury. EU experts remind consumers, if the energy-saving lamp room will be broken, the room ventilated 30 minutes and quickly left the room, then use a damp cloth or tape to collect debris as special waste disposal. It is because of the energy saving bulb containing trace mercury, so the energy saving bulbs need to be treated as special waste.

In contrast, in the European Union related professional institutions in the evaluation of a variety of lamps, LED lights are often among the best score. LED lamp has many advantages, such as high energy efficiency, good environmental protection effect, long service life, beautiful appearance and light efficiency when it is turned on. Compared with the traditional incandescent lamp, LED lamp can save up to 90%. Currently, the EU market, although the high price of LED lamps, but its life expectancy is 25 times longer than incandescent lamps. LED industry analysts pointed out that after the success of the LED industry in the mobile phone and television industry, has begun to enter the lighting market. With the progress of technology, LED lamp production costs will decline, LED lamp prices will be lowered, the average annual reduction rate of up to 30%. McKinsey research report said that the current price of 20 euros LED lights, in 2020 will fall to less than 3 euros. Experts predict that with the decline in the production cost of the LED lamp, the high-tech bulb will enter mass production stage next year, which will bring about extra energy saving effect and economic benefit.

At present, the European Union lamp market competition is mainly in the energy saving lamps and LED lights. EU lighting industry experts believe that although the energy-saving lamps in the relevant test data is inferior to the LED lamp, but now in terms of production process maturity, pre investment and price costs are significantly better than LED lights. From the EU market sales and energy conservation and emission reduction requirements, energy saving lamps are expected to be the best alternative to incandescent lamps. However, from the perspective of long-term development, LED lamps have a variety of advantages are self-evident, the future is likely to replace the energy-saving lamps become the protagonist of the future world lighting market.