Seven generations ago - just 125 years ago this year - Thomas A. Edison came up with the first commercially viable electric light-bulb pictured above. Other inventors had laid the groundwork, but it was Edison’s genius that turned their tinkering (and a 5-year-old patent he had purchased) into something practical that has changed billions of lives in the most fundamental ways.
To achieve this, he also had to develop the parallel circuit, an improved dynamo, an underground conductor network, voltage regulators, safety fuses, insulating materials, and light sockets with on-off switches.
Edison publicly exhibited his light-bulb in December 1879 - such a short time ago in history, yet beyond the memory of anyone now alive. Before then, humans could light up the dark only by burning oils or natural gas, a stinky and dangerous business. Today we take for granted the gargantuan impact of Edison’s inventiveness (and commercialization efforts).
There are still people who have never seen a light-bulb (or enjoyed the benefits derived from some of Edison’s other 1000+ patented inventions). But, for the majority of the world’s inhabitants, from sophisticated metropoles to savanna villages, electric lights are part of everyday life.
We’ve made a lot of progress with electrified products since Edison came up with that first 40-hour bulb. But, a century and a quarter later, when it comes to one aspect of electricity, we've been stubbornly slow to learn. It’s estimated that
Americans waste more energy than the entire U.S. military budget - $13,000 a second. U.S. investors put $70 billion a year of capital into new power plants. Lighting consumes 20% of all of electricity generated in the U.S. and Canada.
Using the above bulb and its super-efficient cousins instead of the more direct descendants of Edison’s invention would go a long way to curb some of that waste and the “need” for more power plants. Each bulb yields the same light for 13 times as long as an incandescent, consumes 25% as much electricity, and thus keeps a ton of carbon dioxide and 20 pounds of sulfur from being emitted from coal-fired stations, as well as deferring hundreds of dollars in new utility investments.
Energy conservation gurus Amory and Hunter Lovins at the
Rocky Mountain Institute have spent that past 25 years arguing that America (and the rest of the West) should alter the present policy of relentlessly adding megawatts to our generating capacity by first cutting waste. They call theirs the “negawatt” approach. Since that compact fluorescent light bulb like the one in the photograph uses a fourth as much energy as a standard incandescent bulb, replacing one short-lived 100-watt bulb with one long-lived 25-watt cf bulb (that provides equal illumination) "generates" 75 negawatts of saved energy to use somewhere else.
In addition to super-efficient lighting, other changes, like
these, these and
these are needed to really make a difference. (And, obviously, others have energy ideas, too, as discussed last year
here and
here.)
As anyone who has checked out efficient light-bulbs knows, they ain’t cheap. But that’s just upfront cost. Over the extended lifetime of the bulb, you can save as much as $50 in electricity and replacement costs. Multiply that by the number of bulbs in your house and you come out way ahead. More important than the long-term impact on your wallet is what such purchases can do for the even more distant future.
It is said the Iroquois Confederacy deliberated every decision by considering its impact on the seventh generation. I doubt Tom Edison was thinking about his great-great-great-great-great grandchildren when he cranked up that first light-bulb 125 years ago. In that way, we can be a bit smarter than the great inventor. In our personal energy decisions and in public policy, we can and should follow the Iroquois’s self-admonitions and consider what kind of world we will be leaving our descendants in the 22nd Century. All we need is the will, and some politicians with vision.