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The cover story in the September 2011 issue of Wired magazine:

The Future of Light is the LED.

I knew the future of lighting was not compact fluorescents when I came home to the stench of one that had burned out. Its replacement was always turned off before I left the house. The Wired article mentions this fact about cycling CFLs on and off, which I have not previously encountered:


"Consumers didn’t understand that CFLs burn out rapidly when they’re not allowed to rest at least 15 minutes between being cycled off and on, or that they’d overheat and fail if they were used in recessed ceiling canisters; they weren’t told that there was no standard definition of what a 60-, 75-, or 100-watt incandescent replacement actually was."

I have been replacing some of my CFLs with LEDs and in many ways the LEDs are superior. IF they live up to their advertised lifespan they will probably be worth the additional cost, but up front they are a major hit on the credit card.

However, I have already found some situations around the house and in the shop where the improved performance of the LEDs has made the price differential bearable.

I sure do hope that LED lighting will develop quickly and produce affordable and universally usable product soon. Well-intended though it may have been, the CFL approach left enough to be desired. Apart from the issues mentioned in the article, some more basic come to mind: CFL bulbs won't fit in numerous existing fixtures, while in others they simply won't work (my garage door opener comes to mind). Replacing those 'recalcitrant' fixtures will be associated with unforeseen and potentially nontrivial cost.

...not to mention the additional overhead of having to reclaim/recycle the hazardous waste materials involved with CFL's that aren't a factor with conventional incandescent lighting.