Other Lamps, Lighting

A compact fluorescent lamp (CFL), also known as a compact fluorescent light bulb (or less commonly as a compact fluorescent tube ) is a type of fluorescent lamp. more...

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Many CFLs are designed to replace an incandescent lamp and can fit in the existing light fixtures formerly used for incandescents.

Compared to general service incandescent lamps giving the same amount of visible light, CFLs use less power and have a longer rated life. In the United States, a CFL can save over 30 USD in electricity costs over the lamp's lifetime compared to an incandescent lamp and save 2000 times their own weight in greenhouse gases. The purchase price of a CFL is higher than that of an incandescent lamp of the same luminous output, but this cost is recovered in energy savings and replacement costs over the bulb's lifetime. Like all fluorescent lamps, CFLs contain mercury; this complicates the disposal of fluorescent lamps and causes a health risk when they are broken.

CFLs radiate a different light spectrum from that of incandescent lamps. Improved phosphor formulations have improved the subjective color of the light emitted by CFLs such that the best 'soft white' CFLs available in 2007 are subjectively similar in color to standard incandescent lamps.

History

The parent to the modern compact fluorescent lamp (CFL) was invented in the late 1890s by Peter Cooper Hewitt. The Cooper Hewitt lamps were used for photographic studios and industries. Edmund Germer, Friedrich Meyer, and Hans Spanner then patented a high pressure vapor lamp in 1927. George Inman later teamed with General Electric to create a practical fluorescent lamp, sold in 1938 and patented in 1941. The modern CFL was invented by Ed Hammer, an engineer with General Electric, in response to the 1973 oil crisis. While it met its design goals, it would have cost GE about 25 million USD to build new factories to produce them and the invention was shelved. The design was eventually leaked out and copied by others.

Market

Globally introduced in the early 1980s, CFLs have steadily increased in sales volume. The most important advance in fluorescent lamp technology (including CFLs) has been the gradual replacement of magnetic ballasts with electronic ballasts; this has removed most of the flickering and slow starting traditionally associated with fluorescent lighting. There are two types of CFLs: integrated and non-integrated lamps.

Read more at Wikipedia.org