This guy doesn't understand what he is talking about, I'm afraid. This is along the same lines as whether or not congress has the right to set pollution standards for factories and such. Some things are just *not* possible to maintain, and the incandescent lightbulb is one of those things. Incandescents use tungsten filaments, and tungsten can stand very high temperatures for longer times than other filament materials. There is over a meter of tungsten in every light bulb, because they coil the filament, and then coil the coil. There are estimates that at this rate of tungsten consumption the world supply could run out by 2012 at worst, more likely 2020-s. Still the very fact that we are almost out of an element is kind of scary. Also, incandescents are not energy efficient in the least.
CF lightbulbs use hardly any mercury these days, and are pretty safe. They last a long time and provide good light. IMO LED lights are the way to go, but CF is better than incandescents.
And I don't think this is highly political as long as we focus on the lightbulbs, inconveniences, etc. and not on the governments right to control them.
Dan
