$35 a bulb? :( Forget it. When they get LED bulbs down to about $1 per bulb then I might consider it.

They retired several thousand MW of power already here and the rates are the same. Let's put opinions aside here and try to stick with some facts. Do you have any facts that support your claims? Right now most of the facts are against you. I'm from Missouri the "Show-me" state so can you "Show-me" the proof of your claim?

Again, if these were going to acutally replace incandescents then the govt would not need a law to get rid of incandescents. The market would just take to CFL/LEDs because they were economically superior. There is no 'market failure' here, only the govt sticking their nose where it doesn't need to be.

Guest commentary: CFLs and their "issues"
Bill Schweber
1/10/2012 4:53 PM EST
A newsletter reader responds with some thoughtful points about CFLs, reliability, and more

Editor's note: In a recent issue of the Power Management Designline newsletter, I asked about the turn-on/turn-off current of CFLs compared to incandescent bulbs—since the AC-line switch is tested and rated for resistive loads, a non-resistive load may affect switch life. I also linked to a supposedly "helpful" guide to CFLs from the Consumer Federation of America (see here), which I felt was very one-sided and did not admit to any tradeoffs when using non-incandescent bulbs. (You don’t receive the free newsletter? Sign-up details are below.)

A reader, Roger Watkins, provided this insightful response:

"I too have some concerns (as do most informed EE's) with the ban on the incandescents. My concerns are with the lies that have been told to Congress regarding lifetimes of the new technologies (CFL and especially LED), and the significant increase in toxic materials associated with the disposal of these short-lived cheaply made devices.

"Although the lifetime of the LED devices may be rated at 40,000 to 100,000 hours at an appropriate temperature, just like we have all experienced with CFLs, the actual life of the device is generally much shorter due to higher temperature of operation of the device and due to the non-LED components in the assembly. After disassembly of several failed CFL devices and some LED devices, we as a community should understand that the cheap manufacture of such devices will lead to serious pushback and disillusionment of our customers.

"The use of aluminum capacitors in CFL and LED Edison-base devices should be avoided at all costs, and yet it seems that every CFL and LED device I have disassembled, and the photos of every such device I have seen postings of disassembly for, use cheap aluminum capacitors with low temperature ratings. As consumers, most of us are aware that the CFL and LED Edison-base devices fail rapidly in closed fixtures, in outdoor use, in refrigerators, and in oven use.

"The other 'dirty secret' not being discussed much is the dimming with life of LEDs, CFLs, and incandescents as well (as the glass gets tinted by tungsten on an older bulb). The other issue not well understood by non-design types is the change in spectral content from sunlight and incandescent that is associated with LEDs and CFLs.

"Regarding your point on the switch characteristics, generally a 5A resistive -rated switch is rated for about 2A for incandescent loads and about 0.5A for inductive loads, with each specific switch having slightly different ratios. The reason for these large variations are the inductive load has issues with contact separation and stored energy arcing and welding contacts; the incandescent load has a high starting current due to low starting resistance of the filament (similar to capacitive loads but for a different reason); the resistive load has a very nicely behaved characteristic and the only issue is generally contact resistance and self-heating of the switch.

"I am much less worried about the switch failures when converting from incandescents to CFL/LED's because 100W incandescent is generally replaced by less than 30W CFL and by less than 15W LED (with Cree XML or XPG LEDs or similar, again the use of non-specified and overstock cheap LEDs in Chinese manufactured equipment may have a big impact here and lead to even more disillusionment of our customers). If one had a 2A incandescent switch, even an inductive load rating of 0.5A is more than adequate for the 30W CFL.

"Please note that most of the LED schemes will require PFC and such PFC should make the load even less inductive or capacitive in its behavior. I base the 100W equivalent values of CFL and LED lamps on the lumen output of the different types of lamps.

"We are all aware that there is quite a bit of subjectivity here, and that use of non-specified components in the CFL or LED lamp circuitry, especially in the CFL or LED elements themselves, often makes the manufactured lumen output somewhat less than the designed and prototyped lumen output.

"By the way, we both agree on the advocacy issue for the CFA report. As is typical of such a publication, they have accepted the initial brightness figure for the CFL to compute the energy savings, and the 10× figure for bulb life (both unreasonable based on experience). They are spouting nonsense that will give consumers ridiculous expectations on the LED bulbs' lifetimes when consumers are being sold LED assemblies built with cheap aluminum electrolytic capacitors."

In the last 6 years the rate has dropped. This current billing rate is the first increase in 6 years and it's still well below the rate of 6 years ago.

Effective Dates Regular Residential (R-1)
11/1/11 - 4/30/12 8.265¢/kWh
5/1/11 - 10/31/11 7.282¢/kWh
11/1/10 - 4/30/11 8.083¢/kWh
5/1/10 - 10/31/10 8.110¢/kWh
1/1/10 - 4/30/10 8.828¢/kWh
11/1/09 - 12/31/09 8.639¢/kWh
5/1/09 - 10/31/09 9.714¢/kWh
11/1/08 - 4/30/09 12.660¢/kWh
5/1/08 - 10/31/08 11.790¢/kWh
11/1/07 - 4/30/08 10.919¢/kWh
5/1/07 - 10/31/07 10.215¢/kWh
11/1/06 - 4/30/07 11.672¢/kWh
5/1/06 - 10/31/06 9.693¢/kWh
11/1/05 - 4/30/06 10.718¢/kWh

Any other theories?

It is not in the best interest of anyone for the utility to go bankrupt, so the rate increase will be approved and everyone will pay a little bit more.

It's just bad press if they go around disconnecting poor people who can't pay their electric bill due to unemployment or illness.

Agreed. On a side note, I just changed out a front porch CFL. I always date the bulbs with a perma-marker. This one was dated 12-22-2004. Now that's a pretty good life - it runs from dusk till dawn.

FYI: You being a FL person and me being a FL person as well I know you don't know most cold weather states have LAWS that prohibit utilities from being turned off regardless of anything.

You can ignore paying your power bill for 2-3 months and run it up as much as you want. They can't turn it off, period.