DOE Issues New Lighting-Efficiency Standards

The Dept. of Energy has announced final regulations that set higher efficiency standards for residential and commercial lighting. The rules, issued June 26, apply to general-service fluorescent lamps (GSFLs) and incandescent reflector lamps (IRLs), which together account for about 45% of total lighting-energy use, DOE says. Under the rules, which take effect in 2012, electricity used in GSFLs would be cut by 15% and 25% in IRLs

DOE says the cost of the more efficient lamps would be as much as 13 times higher than current GSFL products’ prices and 47% to 64% higher than current IRL prices. But it says during new models’ lives, consumers would save as much as $8.66 per lamp for GSFLs and up to $7.95 per lamp for IRLs in energy costs.

Bruce Buckley is a freelance writer and photographer based in the Washington, D.C., area.

Tom Ichniowski has been writing about the federal government as ENR’s Washington Bureau Chief since the George H.W. Bush administration, and he has covered at least five major highway bills. A recognized expert on government policy on infrastructure and regulation, Tom is also a Baltimore native and Orioles fan who grew up rooting for Brooks and Frank Robinson. He is a graduate of Columbia College and Columbia’s graduate school of journalism, where he once used “unrelentless” in a headline.

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