| Glass Box Contains the Ghost of the Incandescent Lightbulb |
| Written by Hank Green | ||
| Thursday, 26 October 2006 | ||
 This Halloween, celebrate the death of the incandescent lightbulb with a GlowBrick. These glassy cubes each contain a phosphorescent core surrounded by the image if a lightbulb. They spend the daylight hours collecting energy and then, in the night time, they become "a disembodied shining lightbulb hanging in midair." Maybe incandescent bulbs will all die, only to show up around Halloween as glowbricks. Maybe not. But while the glowbrick is cool, it isn't really all that useful. But maybe someday you can use one to show your grandkids what light bulbs used to look like.
If you're interested in that kind of entertainment, then head to the Science Toy Store, but keep in mind that it'll set you back about $40.
Comments
(3)
Temporal obsessions
written by GTW , October 29, 2006
Unsurprisingly Disagreeing
written by Hank , October 29, 2006
But the time is now. I'll be there condemning LEDs too, when time comes. And I'll gladly praise fossil fuels over whale oil any day. But, right now, LEDs and CFLs are the best we can do, so we need to praise them. We need to encourage people to buy them and encourage companies to develop them. And we, ourselves, need to be open to these new things so we can celebrate when another step is taken.
But it's not the first step, and we probably don't acknowledge that enough. But, more importantly, it's also not the last step, and hopefully, it never will be.
Just to let you know
written by Fria , October 29, 2006
As far as energy efficiency, the fluorescent bulb is still the king. It gives out more light per energy input than even LEDs, which really aren't that efficient. In order for LEDs to give off enough light to make them practical, they tend to be over driven. That causes them to create a lot of heat which is wasted energy. LEDs good points tend to be their ruggedness, more accurate white color and life expectancy.
As far as this glow bulb is concerned, for now it's just a toy. But I have heard of some new technology that seems to combine LEDs with a phosphorescent coating that creates even more light than either does separately. But, I can't recall the specifics. | ||
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Science, technology gadgets and...baby seals. We're in a bit of an eco-mess, but we've got the brains to lick any problem. And that's why EcoGeek.org publishes up to ten stories daily about innovations that are saving the planet.
And if that sounds interesting to you, then congratulations, you're an EcoGeek.
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It's only a matter of time when the world population gets higher and even LEDs aren't going to be enough to save energy. Then some other type of light source will come about and the people who're eco-bloggers then will bad mouth the LEDs...
If we step out of this current time frame and just look at how people think in general, it's just funny. The moral of the story is... It's obvious that better things will come about, so there's no need to praise or condemn anything since we know nothing is here forever.