07/19/07
The EFAy has written to Europe’s Energy Commissioner to urge him to endorse the agreement made by EU Governments in March this year to impose a blanket ban on incandescent bulbs throughout the bloc and to draw up proposals to phase them out of use at the earliest opportunity.

In addition, the EFAy call on the Commission to impose a shorter time frame for the ban than the one proposed by European Lamp Companies Federation (ELC) in an attempt to reduce carbon dioxide emissions further. The use of energy saving light bulbs, as opposed to the inefficient incandescent type, could substantially reduce emissions when it is considered that lighting accounts for a vast proportion of the EU energy consumption.

However, the energy efficient light bulbs already widely in use, are not devoid of their own environmental drawbacks either. One of the components used in the bulbs is mercury and the future safe disposal of them has raised concerns in the Commission. However, the EFAy believe that at this stage the general use of the more ecological bulbs far outweighs the environmental cost of using the incandescent ones.

The full text of the letter sent to the Energy Commission is set out below:

Dear Commissioner Andris Piebalgs

Ban on incandescent light bulbs

The European Free Alliance Youth (EFAy) welcomes the recent moves by the European Parliament to advocate an EU wide ban on the use of the incandescent light bulb and its replacement with energy efficient alternatives.

We now call on the European Commission to endorse the agreement made by EU Governments in March this year to impose a blanket ban on incandescent bulbs throughout the bloc and to draw up proposals to phase them out of use at the earliest opportunity. Rather than the 2015 deadline that the European Lamp Companies Federation (ELC) proposes, we believe that a shorter time frame is possible and necessary, if Carbon Dioxide emissions are to be reduced substantially.

As you will be aware Australia plan to switch to energy efficient light bulbs by 2010 and will be followed by Canada soon after. The EU also needs to impose tough legislation on the use of incandescents, considering the huge percentage of all electricity consumption that lighting accounts for in the EU. Therefore we believe that a ban on the use of incandescent light bulbs by 2010 is not unrealistic, if the Commission acts quickly enough and promotes the use of more eco-friendly bulbs through an effective marketing campaign.

Through our own organisations, we are aware that young people are enthusiastic about the idea of promoting energy efficiency, if quality of life can be maintained and the environment stands to be protected for the future. Using more energy efficient bulbs would have very little impact on the daily lives of the peoples of the EU, but would have a huge energy and environmental saving in the long term.

We would be very interested to hear your own views on this matter and look forward to hearing from you soon.

Yours sincerely

EFAy Bureau