Efficiency Gains Could Prove Proposed Plasma Ban Shortsighted 278
hihopes writes "As the EU calls for a ban on plasma TVs, a leading Harvey Norman executive said that the issue should be left to vendors, who at the recent CES Show in the USA showed an array of low-powered TV display screens."
Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Informative)
Before everyone starts wetting themselves, calm down. While the frothing-at-the-mouth article states:
The EU is not actually thinking about banning a particular technology, but:
Source [ecogeek.org]. The new, more efficient Plasmas mentioned in TFA will presumably be fine under the legislation.
I now return you to your anti-EU anti-regulation frothing-at-the-mouth posts.
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm no free market radical, but this does seem like a good example of something that is best left to the market.
There is a direct and increasing incentive for consumers to buy lower energy use products. Therefore there is a direct incentive to reduce the energy use in these panels. Therefore the market is likely to either produce lower energy use plasmas, or LCDs or other similar technologies which have plasma-like quality.
The time and money no doubt involved in this regulatory process might be better spent on improving the level of mandatory information disclosed in relation to all electrical products so that consumers can (voluntarily) make an informed decision.
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Insightful)
You'd be right if the energy cost of a large TV was noticeable in end users' wallets. But it's not.
It's the usual thing about internalizing energy costs. Energy is way too cheap for the market to have much of an effect. Why else would the US need gas mileage standards?
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Fair point. But I suppose as with other issues, there is the option of creating widespread awareness of the issue so that people at least have the ability to make the best choice. If you do that and find that the underlying problem is still
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Insightful)
There's also the commons.
I own a bigscreen TV. And I have no clue what so ever what sort of effect it has on my energy bill.
And even if I did know, I would still be willing to spend the money... after all it's a bigscreen TV it's not a frugal purchase, it's like buying a sports car. :D
That all being said if everyone was willing to spend the money but that expenditure had a detrimental effect on the commons (In say the need to build another nuclear reactor, the need to improve transmission lines, etc) I should be stopped for my own good.
"Why should I spend more on an energy efficient TV when Bob across the street saves $500."
This is a beef I have with commuters. I'm always hearing demands from people who live 50 miles from work that I need to spend 20 billion dollars on highway improvements. Meanwhile I spend an extra $400 a month to live close to work and drive less than 10 miles and don't touch an interstate.
Commuting to work 80 miles round trip has additional costs than just the energy consumed. The tax payer also picks up the tab for high way improvements, expensive on/off ramp and traffic solutions etc. It's the same with any energy expenditure. The costs don't always get passed along with the energy bill-- even with propper education. And you can be certain that if Joe Next Door is saving money and not doing the 'right thing' there is a serious disincentive to do the right thing yourself.
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:4, Insightful)
This is a beef I have with commuters. I'm always hearing demands from people who live 50 miles from work that I need to spend 20 billion dollars on highway improvements. Meanwhile I spend an extra $400 a month to live close to work and drive less than 10 miles and don't touch an interstate.
The people living further away are paying 36 cents + 8% in taxes on every gallon of fuel they spend. It's a tax that scales with usage, and is reasonably fair in that regard. The vehicle registration tax (or I guess it's called a fee here in California, since that way they can raise it without a 66% majority vote) is a little more unfair, though I guess it's closer to a property tax that scales based on the value of your car.
I think the EU's ban is rather silly. I support the EnergyStar stickers that show people how much they'll be paying a year in energy costs for an appliance, since that will indeed encourage people to buy more efficient appliances, but just banning them is silly. If I'm willing to pay the money to power my appliance, and the power company is making a profit off me, who exactly is losing? In France, it'd even be coming from nuclear power, so the hippies worrying about CO2 emissions and the like have nothing to worry about.
Seriously, it's the magic of the invisible hand that issues like that are taken care of.
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:4, Insightful)
If I'm willing to pay the money to power my appliance, and the power company is making a profit off me, who exactly is losing?>
Joe Next Door loses when electricity rates go up in reponse to the increased electricity demand. They likely won't come down until years after a new generation plant is built to pay off the cap-ex. So your increase in demand is being subsidized by your Joe Next Door paying more for the same amount of electricity, or by his reduction in electricity use to maintain the same agregate demand.
Seriously, it's the magic of the invisible hand that issues like that are taken care of.
In this case, the pressure to improve power efficiency would have been delayed while waiting for the invisible hand to stop scratching its ass.
On the broader issue of global warming, waiting for the invisible hand to correct the market is a non-starter. By the time market pressures build enough for people to notice, the damage has been done. The damage needs to be done (ie population reduction due to decreased food production) for there to be a market pressure.
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What all the drastic measures? I mean, who cares how much power a TV costs? It isn't THAT bad....I wouldn't see even a bump in my power bill, so I'm guessing they are having some sort of crisis over there with electric power?
What if gas taxes don't cover all of the costs? (Score:4, Insightful)
If the gas taxes don't cover all of the taxes of increased vehicle usage, then you're actually subsidizing driving, which tends to encourage people to do it more.
I would suspect this is the case, as that $0.36+8% would cost you about $0.015/mile, while your typical self sustaining toll road, which cannot receive federal funding, seems to cost 5-10x that amount. The rest of the money must then come from general taxes, and is therefore encouraging driving via government handout.
In Europe, Nuclear power is heavily subsidized to keep the air clean, so excessive power usage is actually costing the rest of the taxpayers money.
The invisible hand only works when the cost of goods is the actual cost to the public.
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:4, Informative)
>>>Sales taxes are a form of regressive taxation because they take proportionally more from the poor.
"If you repeat a lie often enough, people will start to believe it." A regressive tax is a tax where people (for example) pay 20% income on their first $20,000, 10% upto $100,000, and 5% on anything above that. It is the exact opposite of a progressive tax.
Sales tax (and gasoline tax and bridge/tunnel tolls) are examples of FLAT taxes, because everybody pays the same amount regardless of income.
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There are other problems with this though.
While the strategy you describe should certainly be our primary means of reducing energy consumption, it is in effect a sales tax on energy. Sales taxes are a form of regressive taxation because they take proportionally more from the poor.
So there are a number of options. We could adjust tax rates to compensate. Increase gas taxes while lowering income tax to try to retain the status quo. This will work for people who are actually taxed, but it will do nothing for p
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Absolutely! Transparency is almost always a good thing. Nn increased electricity tax can't work unless consumers can tell which choices use more electricity.
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Wow, you just advocated the power of the invisible hand (free-market infallibility) alongside the need to raise taxes to move said invisible hand.
It's actually a very well reasoned approach but I don't think your ideology is extremist enough to gain any traction... Thanks for playing though.
You then blame a conspiracy by the politicians to drive lobbying dollars into their pockets, which isn't too crazy when it comes to conspiracies. But for your grand finale it appears you conflate the Teacher's Union wit
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You Pay an extra $400 a month to live close
vs.
80 Miles at say 25 mpg estimate so that is 3.2 Gallons per trip then we Multiply that by 20 (For week days) that is 64 Gallons a month. 64*4.00 (I am still using high gas prices) is $256.00 Dollars.
Ok now we put that 20 billion dollar improvement, so lets first estimate how long these improvements will last I will say 10 years. So that is 2 billion a year / 12 month in a year so that is $166 Million a month, now lets say this road gets 2 million drivers a month.
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This is a beef I have with commuters. I'm always hearing demands from people who live 50 miles from work that I need to spend 20 billion dollars on highway improvements. Meanwhile I spend an extra $400 a month to live close to work and drive less than 10 miles and don't touch an interstate.
Do you grow your own food, and produce everything you need within walking distance of your domicile? If not then you benefit from good highways. Your paying more to live closer to work means you aren't spending as much t
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"living close to work" is what has been done for most of history, and was abandoned (mostly) for good reasons.
Actually it was abandoned mostly due to a naive belief in progress by decision makers in the early modern age, a belief that has since proved to be inappropriate. Athens Charter [wikipedia.org]
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everyone living close enough to walk or bike (or even short commute) would be a disaster in itself.
How so? Everyone living 5-10 miles from work and cycling/walking would save a huge amount of energy for transport. I don't see the problem?
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I'm not sure how your post is getting modded up informative. It's not like it makes a whole lot of sense. I don't even know where to begin since I don't think there is one thing there that makes sense aside from large urban centers not being good for the environment, but even that isn't precisely accurate.
Let's start there: Large urban centers are not good for the local environment. Potentially, they could have little effect on the global environment. Currently that's not the case but given more efficie
Energy is not cheap (Score:2)
This is NOT about how cheap energy is to one consumer. It's about total effect of having millions of televisions running at once. Reduced consumption on the grid. Evening is a big power consumption time at home, and the big uses are typically lighting, heating/cooling, and entertainment. Can't really do much about cooking, people have to eat. Lighting energy use is being pushed downward by movement toward CFL and eventually LED sources. Heating/cooling conversions are a huge expense and change in that
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Insightful)
The post below me makes a succinct point. No one (or at least, not enough people for it to be significant) look at the power consumption as a primary attribute for a TV set.
They're not going let the power consumption be the deciding factor between two competing screens. Maybe it's starting to be in the back of people's minds, but in the vast majority of cases, a TV draws so little power in the grand scheme of things (regardless of what the true value actually is) that they don't even consider the cost of electricity to run it, thus manufacturers don't have to worry about it, unless they have some mandatory figures to aim for.
It's not difficult to engineer the panels to be low power (within sensible limits), it just might cost a little more, that either adds to the retail price, or is eaten as a cost by the manufacturer. Either way, it's more beneficial in the grand scheme of energy saving on a national/global scale.
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, assuming that I understand the summary correctly, one of the most important points of this regulation actually IS improving the level of mandatory information - the rest is just throwing out the most blatantly inefficient devices, and I wouldn't be actually surprised if those same devices tended to be badly engineered in general, so it's possible that nothing of value will be lost anyway...
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Insightful)
One of the problems is that having low energy requirements could potentially limit the chance for new technologies to develop. If for example plasma TVs cannot meet the new requirement they may well be scrapped, but potentially if they can remain on the market it is possible that in 5 years time that technology will have developed to the point that plasma TVs use much less energy than the LCD TVs.
A system which prevents any technology from co-existing also prevents that technology from developing which is a bad thing.
Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Informative)
They are not banning plasmas - they are banning very inefficient devices of all types, these tend to be some of the older designs of plasmas...
They are also forcing manufacturers to label new TV's showing how much energy they use so people have a choice ....
They would also prevent the sale of any new technology if it were very inefficient, but that is a good thing surely?
Looks all good to me .... another "EU bans xxxxx" which turns out a) they are not and b) it is a sensible decision....
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Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Informative)
Energy-costs aren't high enough that it makes a difference to the end-consumer, in many cases.
Let's look at the maths for a fairly typical consumer wanting a new 50" TV, watching it for an average of 4 hours/day.
Alternative A: Plasma, $2000, 450W. Alternative B: LCD, $2500, 200W.
Now, 4 hours a day for a year is around 1450 hours, so A will consume around 650Kwh and B will consume around 290Kwh. The difference is 360Kwh, where I live this power will cost you about $40.
In -principle- he'll have saved back the 500 extra he paid for the TV in 12 years, assuming he keeps it that long...
But it just plain doesn't register in the wallet anyway. If we say he -does- keep the TV for 10 years, then the total bill for TV these 10 years looks something like this:
A: $2000 + $70(power)*10 + $40(cable)*120 = $7500
B: $2500 + $30(power)*10 + $40(cable)*120 = $7600
In this particular example, the plasma even ends up being the cheaper alternative. Even if plasma and lcd cost the same, the plasma would still cost only $400 more over the 10-year period, or put differently $3 more each monthh.
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Not to mention that plasma TVs are typically 70-80% cheaper than same-size LCD screens.
By mandating low-power screens they're also mandating higher prices for consumers... and manufacturers.
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Re:Not banning plasmas. (Score:5, Interesting)
10 years? Without lead solder I doubt they will last that long. Going after standby power seems more productive.
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I would agree with you if consumers were provided with sufficient information to make informed choices, but they're not. In markets where consumers are unable to determine the quality of products (where quality in this particular example is energy efficiency; consumers are generally well informed about other quality metrics like brightness, resolution, size, etc...), only the worst products survi
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I see plasmas as a technology that's going to pass since it will be superseded by other technologies. LCD and LED are growing and getting better for each generation.
So plasmas will go the same way as CRT:s and back-projection devices.
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CA wants a ban on energy guzzling Plasma as well [ecogeek.org] ...and no, LCD isn't immune.
I'm reading a number of /. posts from folks [wiktionary.org] who feel this matter should be 'left to the market.'
LOL
Misguided (Score:2)
Why not go after the big offenders for power usage? Lighting and heating? Or the stupidly wasteful standby modes on many TVs, computers and appliances?
Overly aggressive standards for something that doesn't draw a huge amount of power and should not really even be on for more than a few hours a day, seems a little foolish. People are watching less TV than ever, it's being replaced by computer usage. This is especially true in western nations (probably because historically we've been watching excessive amount
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In most parts of the US you can buy 100W incandescent, but the sub-20W CFLs are subsidizes so much that they are much cheaper to purchase.
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> Why not go after the big offenders for power usage? Lighting and heating? Or the stupidly wasteful standby modes on many TVs, computers and appliances?
They do. Standby is handled in the same piece of legislation, which an eventual limit of 0.5W. Lighting also falls under the same rules, with the least energy efficient product (the 25W opaque incandescent light bulb and its friends) bound to disappear from the market.
Heating is dealt with in national legislation, and for example in Germany condensing bo
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As someone who lives in a EU country, I think my frothing-at-the-mouth is completely justified, as this will limit my purchasing choices. Apparently the EU fuckers are at it again, having already dealt with the huge threat that are the patio heaters [theregister.co.uk].
I'm not surprised the EU isn't completely hands off in terms of the energy policy and regulation so that's not what I'm complaining about, but outright banning TVs that aren't quite up to their arbitrary standards is retarded. Labeling system? That's fine, there
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If patio heaters were used for patios, you might have a point. In reality, however, most northern cities are full of them atm, heating, well, the outside.
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Beautiful post, shouldn't have been done AC so I could have given it some points.
It is indeed a thought I have had many a time about the UK. Why don't they just fuck off if they hate the EU so much? However, given the falling pound I welcome their existence in the EU as it gives me a low-cost destination just across the pond. When I say pond I mean the North Sea, as I'm a Dutch resident.
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It should also be noted that it isn't just some current plasma displays that will be affected: various existing LCD and back projection systems (and a lot of other electronic devices) will also fall afoul of the proposed legislation because they draw too much power in standby mode.
It's also a fact that despite the bleating about the "green" benefits, most EU members are likely so support this legislation for far more pragmatic reasons. The EU's been taught some nasty lessons over the last couple of years th
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Who'da-thunk the first post on a nerd site would ruin the whole thing with facts.
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Why not just tax energy use? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's never made sense to me why governments think that micromanaging things like what lightbulbs can be sold or how much power TVs can consume is a smart method for curbing energy use.
If your goal is to improve energy efficiency, economists have figured out a remarkably simple and efficient method: tax electricity use. A 25% surcharge on each kilowatt-hour used would cause people to buy more energy-efficient products, meaning companies would shift resources toward building less power-hungry devices. A simple energy tax has the same ultimate effect as regulating efficiency across myriad consumer electronics, but without the need for a massive government bureaucracy.
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To greatly lower energy use for the whole nation, build a 'B' ark for the government and their parasitic consultants, lobbyists etc.
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In Netherlands at least, they already do this.
Yet when I walk into an shop selling light fittings, all I can see is designs based on multiple halogen bulbs.
So I've got two lights which between them use 15 x 40w halogen bulbs! That's 600w of lighting goodness.
So yeah, banning such lights would be an excellent idea.
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Because not all products offer cheaper alternatives. You'd effectively be raising the price 25% on things where there is no other option.
One example is that I have a heated greenhouse here in the UK, it's heated because I grow exotic plants, including cultivation of species that are critically endangered in the wild which I sell on cheaply to help discourage sales of habitat collected plants which I can undercut because the risk of smuggling carries a higher price than the price I can charge growing in bulk
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I have to admit I've not really come across heat pumps before. How do they work? Temperatures can get as low as -8C here and the over-winter temperatures I need to reach are around a minimum of 10C to 15C mark over night. I also need to make sure humidity is kept low, as many plants are desert plants, those that aren't I have seperate units for (not hydroponic as such, just closed containers with a gravel/water base).
I already lower the greenhouse volume over winter when the heaters need to be on by running
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> If your goal is to improve energy efficiency, economists have figured out a remarkably simple and efficient method: tax electricity use.
This wins on simplicity, but the problem is, for example, someone struggling to heat a small flat with electricity gets a price hike they can not afford, whilst the target Mr-I-do-not-give-a-**** (sorry: I would guess it is usual Mr who buys big TVs, not Mrs) just pays a little more and does not even notice it (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regressive_tax/ [wikipedia.org]).
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The point being? If an industry requires a lot of electricity than people buying less of it's products (due to increased costs due to extra taxes) will LOWER electricity use. It's the system working properly assuming the goal is actually to lower electricity usage.
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Why energy hungry industries argue for tax exemptions is, that they still need to compete with companies in countries, where energy is not taxed as heavily.
> They could make laws to make power-consumption more visible in advertizing.
My suggestion would be, that the total costs of a device for an average use over a fixed time (say 10 years) must be displayed including energy, water, expected repair- and replacement costs for an common average use. Preferably at the same font size as the nominal price.
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In germany we do have some experience with taxing energy.
The problem is that you need to create lot of exceptions for the energy hungry industries (at least the lobbiests make you to do so).
Why not just tax/price industrial power differently from residential power?
To some degree, they are being priced differently as it is anyway.
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(at least the lobbiests make you to do so).
Does Germany also have a new standards system for lobbying? For example, you have a lobby, lobbier and lobbiest in ascending order of superiority?
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Clearly you won't see much of a difference on your electricity bill if you use a more efficient light bulb
I think you can, in some cases. I replaced the 50W halogen bulbs in my flat with 1W LED bulbs. The light isn't quite as good, but I changed 28 50W bulbs, of which about 12 are on for about 6 hours a day. That's 12 * 0.05kW * 6 hours * 30 = 108kWh a month. That's about £15 a month off the bill!
But I agree with your main point.
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Out of curiosity, why do you need so many lights on at once? Do you grow lots of plants indoors or just live in a gigantic apartment with about 14 rooms? Plant growing seems to be a good candidate for LED lighting since you can focus on the ranges of wavelengths that promote growth, flowering, etc.
Tough call (Score:4, Insightful)
"Let the market decide" is almost religious dogma in the United States. And it's not a completely unfounded idea. People tend to buy things that provide a better quality of life at a lower cost, and companies tend to provide things that are more profitable, so cheaper and better quality wins over more expensive and crappier.
But one thing that many of the "free market everywhere" people miss completely is the idea of the tragedy of the commons. I don't need to try to explain it [wikipedia.org] as it's already explained well elsewhere. But it's one concept that the "free market" Libertarian types completely ignore, at their own peril.
In this case, people are notoriously bad at figuring long term expenses that are sustained and slightly elevated. People will tend to pay $10,000 over the life of a car for a "cheaper" model that costs $4,000 less. They'll tend to buy the plasma TV that costs $300 less than the $2000 LED TV that lasts twice as long and uses 30% less electricity.
And this affects the commons because power is increasingly a rare resource being squandered to provide a 5' wide screen typically viewed 15 feet back that provides the same viewing aspect ratio as a 19" TV at 4 feet at 11x the power. Power that isn't then available for running manufacturing plants, hospitals, and other things that generate real wealth, and require a tax-funded power plant to compensate for.
On the other hand, regulations take a long time to change, and marketplaces can change quickly. A bad law, once past, might take a decade to be redacted or canceled by jurisprudence, but the technology regulated by the bad law may render the law moot in 2 years due to other market forces.
I tend to feel towards deregulation, since I'm American. But I can see that Plasma tech just might be a bad idea!
Re:Tough call (Score:5, Insightful)
There are several fallacies here. First, the idea that watching TV doesn't constitute "real wealth" is false. The very manufacturing plants you admit are valuable exist solely to provide goods and services that consumers demand. No, TVs aren't necessities, but that doesn't mean they aren't of economic value. Value is in the eye of the beholder, and lots of people quite clearly get utility from their television sets. So televisions are just as much a form of wealth as any other good.
Second, power plants are in almost all cases privately funded, at least in the U.S. The money you pay each month to your local electricity provider is going to a privately owned firm, albeit one that likely enjoys rate-of-return protection granted by government. Power is not running out, either. Will the cost of energy today persist as fossil fuels become more difficult to obtain? Probably not, but lots of neat forms of energy become viable once prices rise. By the time oil, uranium, coal, and natural gas resources all begin to dwindle, new technologies will have made new forms of elecricity generation economically feasible.
You claim that people tend to underestimate long-term costs and overestimate short-term gains. The LED example, however, actually shows that people are making the right decisions by sticking with plasma. The amount of electricity required to power a TV is still quite inexpensive--around 3 to 5 cents per hours--and so it'd take years to make up for a $300 price difference. And since pretty much any TV currently sold is going far past its obsolescence, it's fairly unimportant how long a TV will last. 8 years of 12 years are both very long timeframes among the modern consumer.
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Right, but what are the unintended consequences of burning through all of those resources with nothing more than the hope that the invisible hand will take care of everything? Potentially irreversible and hazardous environmental changes, infrastructure reliant upon the false assumption of a never ending supply of energy exploitable at a rap
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And this affects the commons because power is increasingly a rare resource being squandered to provide a 5' wide screen typically viewed 15 feet back that provides the same viewing aspect ratio as a 19" TV at 4 feet at 11x the power.
The distance you view a TV from doesn't affect the aspect ratio in any way at all.
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Not to mention: third, the initial cost of an item is often proportional to the initial externalities of polution and energy consumption. I don't happen to know whether this is true of plasma and LCD TVs, but it is true in many real-life examples. For instance, most of us instinctively dislike disposable styrofoam coffee cups - we can see and feel in our hands plastic that we will immediately throw away. But one requires many hundreds of styrofoam cups to equal the energy and polution costs of one ceramic m
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Guess you never heard of rolling blackouts, then? Explain that to my servers that were down for some 2 days as a result? /Sarcasm
How do you conclude that it must be from increasing scarcity? It very well may be bad infrastructure or the plant simply not properly keeping up with increasing power demands. Perhaps they don't have the equipment to properly provide an entire area with power. Think Sim City--the plant may simply be overtaxed. That says nothing about the amount of fuel available.
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That is, until it ain't cheap. Then f-ck you! Thanks for helping out, eh, raping the commons?
Might as well hire a "Commons Czar" that dictates everything we do result in maximum efficiency and utility for the whole, the commons. He can shuffle around food, power resources (yay!), and even jobs as he sees fit.
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So... consumers are short sighted? Thanks for making my point!
Just had to reply to this one as well, as it was too cute. If you think that consumers are short sighted, just wait until you see the US government's national debt :)
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That's because people value time highly.
10k extra over the life of a car. My car's 14 years old. That 4k savings up front? It's a great deal, the extra $400/yr would be lost in the noise.
$300 dollars savings on something that's going to be obsolete in 5 years? Again good deal. at 17c/kwh, it takes a lot of hours of watching to use up that $300. Let's say a plasma uses 50% more power than an LCD. At the high-end, plasma's seem to use 400w.
http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-6475_7-6400401-3.html [cnet.com]
US$300/0.17c
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In this case, people are notoriously bad at figuring long term expenses that are sustained and slightly elevated. People will tend to pay $10,000 over the life of a car for a "cheaper" model that costs $4,000 less. They'll tend to buy the plasma TV that costs $300 less than the $2000 LED TV that lasts twice as long and uses 30% less electricity.
The reason for this isn't necessarily because of being bad at figuring out expenses, it's because of a lack of information. People generally don't know power consum
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The problem is that some things that are a requirement for actually surviving have a very high energy draw. Heating, fridge and stove comes to mind.
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By the same logic, people should not partake in recreational strenuous activities like sports becaus
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But then would it not be a good idea to simply force the manufacturers to label the power usage by law on each set?
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Adam Smith.
He never claimed that markets didn't need regulation.
Just regulation to keep the market working. e.g. Government prevention of collusion by market participants.
Not the answer (Score:2, Insightful)
Harvey Norman? (Score:3, Insightful)
"BRING YOUR TRUCK BRING YOUR TRAILER BRING YOUR CASH!!!! HARVEY NORMAN'S HARDLY NORMAL SALE IS NOW ON!!!!!" etc, etc, ad nauseam.
They have a vested interest in shifting as many Plasma TVs as possible, and who cares about the environmental cost, so *obviously* they would say that wouldn't they? Let's hear from someone with valid, objective credentials, please.
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Harvey also has the shoutiest ads in Ireland ....
Have a listed to this - you'll get a giggle.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=d9S4Z7cER0o [youtube.com]
Figures? (Score:5, Insightful)
For God's sake HOW MANY FUCKING WATTS DO THEY USE? When they studiously avoid giving any numbers in a two page article, one has to assume it is not good.
Re:Figures? (Score:4, Informative)
The answer is, "not very much"
http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-6475_7-6400401-3.html [cnet.com]
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Are you being ironic? Because that doesn't look like a figure to me.
I know that I could find out easily enough, probably in the link you gave. But why the aversion to stating a number up front?
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Looking at the 50-inch plasma screens, the lowest is 163W and the highest is 609W. That's quite a range. Maybe it really is worthwhile setting legally enforced efficiency standards, because it's clear the industry hasn't sorted the issue out.
Looking at the moderation scores I see some comments get flagged in the negative territory and others go as high as 5. Maybe it is worthwhile setting legally enforced slashdot commenting standards, because it's clear the digerati hasn't sorted the issue out.
The EcoFascists have arrived (Score:2)
It's one thing to care about the environment. It's another thing entirely to use the force of criminal law to impose your conservationist concerns on the rest of society.
Crybaby. (Score:2, Troll)
It's one thing to care about the environment. It's another thing entirely to use the force of criminal law to impose your conservationist concerns on the rest of society.
Oh cry me a river. Hyperbole much? A little regulation on power consumption is not criminal law you stupid fucking whiner.
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No they didn't. Check your sources.
The EU has mandated a phaseout by 2012, it's up to member states how they implement that. In the UK, for example, the government and retailers are working together on a voluntary programme.
You can make a comparison with the regulation of fridge and freezer power consumption a few years ago. The EU put limits on how much power they could draw (banning the lest efficient types) and required that fridges and freezers should display th
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Actually read the article.
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Dude, they banned the sane of 100W bulbs.
No they haven't. (The EU will ban most 100W incandescents come September however)
As in, you sell it, you go to jail.
Completely wrong. Link to (proposed or actual) jail-time penalties if you think you're right.
OT: Your sig: Watching Idiocracy and posting on Slashdot at the same time is, umm, spooky.
Replying to people who are smugly watching Idiocracy & oozing their sense of self-superiority, when they obviously believe everything they read in the daily mail is, um
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Oh look, a whiny libertarian tacking fascist onto the end of a concept that effects the only thing he values, his wallet.
How novel.
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Huh? If they made the price of 100W lightbulbs excessive then it would affect my wallet, but they didn't, they banned it.
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So you're saying it's okay for them to regulate price, but not to regulate the ability to sell at all?
Regulating the price to that extreme would mean nowhere would stock them anyway so you still wouldn't get hold of them. The net effect would be the same - removal from sale, so what's the problem exactly?
Your outburst just sounds like an excuse to rant at environmentalists. What's wrong, are you mad at them because they're making you pay the actual price of your polluting products (i.e. the cost of the item
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Ya, and such an attitude can be used to justify anything.
Lets not forget their radio emissions... (Score:2)
typical british media, anti-EU rant (Score:4, Interesting)
What's worse is when other lazy journalists pick up on the headlines and make further embellishments, without checking any of the source material. Even when these stories are categorically denied, the lasting impression - from the "drip, drip" effect is to produce an anti-EU sentiment, which suits a few (usually foreign) media owners, to further their own goals.
In the end, we get the media we deserve - but boy, do we pay for it!
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The EU ARE creators of loony rules and regulations. This whole fight-the-global-warming craziness is just that, craziness. Most likely, there is no human-caused global warming at all, and the EU is fighting windmills here. Europe is facing huge energy hunger, that is evident, but the way out is to build more power stations (preferably, nuclear), not to limit the power of the light bulbs of the diagonal of the plasma TVs.
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Why preferably nuclear? Coal is much cheaper and in plentiful supply for the expected life of the power stations.
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Coal plants emit more radioactive material [sciam.com] and also kills more people yearly from respiratory diseases than people died in Chernobyl.
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Most likely, there is no human-caused global warming at all,
Why the hell would you say this, when almost all of the evidence points in the opposite direction?
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"They love to present the EU as the creator of "loony rules" and regulations."
[rant]
And that happens for a reason. We could start with the very basic fact that the EU maintains two parliaments approximately 350 km apart and moves between these two parliaments (one in France and one in Belgium) every month. This would correspond to the US Congress moving between Washington and New Jersey every month. Do you consider such a decision to be sane?
Well more to the point. I am a scientist and I have had the unfort
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As a British citizen I have to agree.
If there was one change I could make to the regulation of the media I'd say it should be to make them more accountable for what they write.
One example I recall is that the BBC and many other media outlets reported that in the killing of Stephen Pakeerah, a copy of Manhunt was found in the killers belongings and hence there was an inference that it was partly to blame for the fact the kid killed him by beating him to death with a hammer. The police however came forward an
EU does not ban, it informs people, pushes manufs. (Score:5, Informative)
When energy efficiency comes into play, EU usually does not "ban" something, but it tries to inform people so they can make beter choice (=support "free market at play" argument). The second method is to establish some minimum/maximum value (such as for emissions from vehicles) to push manufacturers research better options. EU own wording is:
The energy demand in households accounts for 25% of the final energy needs in the EU. Electricity used for domestic appliances in households show the sharpest increase. Higher standards of living and comfort, multiple purchases of electric appliances and the growing need for air-conditioning are main reasons for this trend to prevail. Energy consumption by consumer electronics and new media as Internet is also steadily growing.
The response is to act in two complementary ways:
* Energy Labelling of household appliances: Seen that the market of household appliances such as washing machines, dishwasher, oven, air-conditioning systems etc. are highly visible to the consumer, the intention is to increase consumer's awareness on the real energy use of household appliances through a liable and clear labelling in their sales points.
* Minimum Efficiency Requirements: Compulsory minimum efficiency requirements will encourage producers of household appliances to improve the product design in view to lower the energy consumption at their use.
Electric appliances in EU are labelled according to their energy consumption. When you go to buy refrigerator or washer, you will find such standardized label on the device. Many people use these labels (or in effect device energy efficiency class) to choose better. Following page shows such label:
http://www.greenlabelspurchase.net/ha-eu-energy-labelling.html [greenlabelspurchase.net]
Actual EU legislation is here:
http://ec.europa.eu/energy/demand/legislation/domestic_en.htm [europa.eu]
Now, to put things in perspective: average electricity usage per year is 4000..16000kWh in US (source: Wikipedia), ~3000kWh in UK (source: electricity company), ~1600..2200kWH in PL (source: electricity company). In Poland this would calculate to 300-500USD (depending on exchange rate, which varies wildly).
According to studies done in Poland, TV is the fourth largest household electricity consumer. The first is refrigerator (33%), 2nd lighting and small appliances (25%), 3rd washing machine (10%). This assumes that you use gas for cooking.
Classic 21" TV (max ~55W) uses about 7-8% of energy consumed per year (in UK/US this might be much more), so you end up paying around 30-50USD per year just for TV electricity. Using large LCD (42", max ~200W) almost quadruples that number (yes, I know that depending on settings LCD might use less energy). Using Plasma (max ~400W) makes the situation even worse (yes, there are some optimization techniques claimed by manufacturers). You end up paying 4-7x as much for new TV as you used to.
Given these calculations it is clear that EU has started to do something about TV efficiency, as more and more people buy LCD/Plasma.
And computer? it's under 3%. Less than an electric kettle.
I Thank God I do not live in the EU (Score:2)
This kind of thing is something government should stay out of. One cannot install a 100W light bulb? Now they want to ban plasma? I've gone CFL where possible and I have been changing some of the incandescent lamps with CFLs at my new office, but there are still applications where incandescent is the only solution; dimmable CFLs are still available in only very limited form factors, whereas incandescents are always compatible with dimmers.
Likewise, plasma televisions/monitors are still superior to LCD for v
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Sorry, but you are both wrong and right in equal measures.
Sony does not MAKE Plasmas, they may SELL them (and only in certain markets), but they do NOT make them (usually made by third party OEMs with a Sony sticker on).
And, at least here in the UK, for the last year or so, they have stopped selling new Consumer Plasma TVs (only LCD, and OLED), and that is according to Sony's own web site.
Yes, I am aware that SOME shops advertise "Sony Plasma TVs", but either they are extremely old models, imports or just p
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"reduce our carbon footprint" (whatever the hell that's really supposed to mean, BTW; to some that means 'removing as many humans from the planet as possible')
This brings up an idea I had; should Assassins be allow to form an Corporation to sell carbon set offs? Tim S PS: I consider "carbon set offs" to be wrong thing to do.