The beautiful and ornate light fixtures in Grand Central Station are icons passed to us from 1913. A few days ago, as I walked my usual path through the crowds in the Main Concourse, I found my focus on the ten central chandeliers. Each one supports one-hundred-forty-four 40-watt bulbs. I was struck by the impact of that number. To burn those standard tungsten bulbs 24 hours a day at 40 watts apiece requires 57600 watts. Notably, I checked one
of the single light fixtures along the wall and those are 50 watt bulbs, perhaps a special purchase. Whatever, my point is that the cost of lighting a 40 watt bulb for 24 hours is approximately $.0.86, assuming the kwh cost is around $0.09. For 1440 of them that's around $452,016.00 each year just for the bulbs in those chandeliers. There are possibly thousands of bulbs throughout the terminal. Why does the MTA need to increase fares when they are so clearly willing to waste money to the tune of millions for an environmentally unfriendly choice?
In the film, "An Inconvenient Truth" it was noted that we could each take personal responsibility for the planet. In my house we have indeed switched to the CF (Compact Florescent) bulbs. The following is a quote from the energystar.gov site: "If every American home replaced just one light bulb with an ENERGY STAR qualified bulb, we would save enough energy to light more than 3 million homes for a year, more than $600 million in annual energy costs, and prevent greenhouse gases equivalent to the emissions of more than 800,000 cars." In our home we have switched out all the bulbs. What's keeping Grand Central from doing the same?
In December here was a lot of talk around the New Year's ball on Times Square being converted to LCD lights and the amazing amount of energy being saved. As I look back now, I'm seeing all that media coverage as so much smoke and mirrors; a slight of hand distracting our collective attention away from something economically and environmentally meaningful. If energy efficient bulbs are good enough for my home and your home, then I would think that they are plenty good enough for our transportation cathedral. Will it continue to be beautiful if all of the bulbs are replaced with energy efficient alternatives? Of course it will: have you not seen the place?
6 comments:
Sci Fi images you might like
How was Rome? Communication and technology to a certain degree have taken over my life. Or is it the other way around? I started this program so that I could have enough tools and knowledge that would empower me to not let the media swallow my brain. I was slowly starting to feel the sonambulance trance effect. We are all so different, and I agree with in Lara Blog generation calling is just a categorization of a certain group. I Believe categorization will be very important for the www.
In regards to electricity my husband has research that:
The wind power in North Dakota could generate enough electricity for 2/3
of the entire US requirements. That doesn't include other plains states-
Kansas, etc. Nor does it include Oaklahoma or the Texas Plains.
Florescent use a fraction of the energy, roughly 1/3 ad last much
much longer. I heard that if every household in America replaced just
one regular bulb with a floresent, it would have the environmental
impact of removing 800,000 cars from the road. Imagine 2 or 3 bulbs
each.
First off thanks for the images. I love them. Very interesting. I once had a neighbor who was a painter. He created very large (8 foot canvasses) of what would ultimately become cover art for sci-fi novels. V cool.
Rome you ask? I completely fell in love with the city, or most of it anyway. The people were warm and friendly, the food terrific (I'm now a huge fan of Orange Sorbeto, and the weather was perfect. However, because we were driving we were able to explore some areas where I suppose tourists don't often wander into. We were returning from a day trip to Orvieto when we used a large but out of the way highway. All along it were dozens of women from perhaps 11 years of age on up selling sex. Disturbing.
Your husband is exactly correct. His research matches mine. And that is exactly my point. Until we as a society are willing to get rid ourselves of the oil based mentality we all need to take whatever measures we can to support an environmentally consciouses stance. That includes major corporations as well as individuals. Currently the company that leads the pack in enviro- consciousness is Canon (yes the camera people). That fact is strange even to them. Their CEO was surprised that other companies, who had considerably more impact, had not been working much harder in that direction.
Grand Central is a prime example of an extravagant waste of fuel without any thought given to impact.
I think this past year the tree in Rock Center was all energy efficient lights so it is baffeling why they wouldn't use them in all public spaces in NY.
Yes, waste. Isn't that the motto in the US? I wish someone would please explain to me again why i have no health care and why i have to pay so much for school. maybe it's because of those lightbulbs...
That's insane!! Great observation - I walk thru grand central everyday and never even noticed that. it makes me mad to think of all the money and energy wasted on things that are so unnecessary.
Post a Comment