Following the U.S., the E.U., and many other countries, China announced today that it will introduce lighting standards in 2012 to phase out inefficient incandescent bulbs by 2016 to help achieve the country's goal to
cut energy consumption by 16 percent and carbon emissions by 17 percent before 2015.
Xinhua News Agency reported today that imports and sales of 100-watt-and-higher incandescent light bulbs will be banned as of Oct. 1, 2012, with additional standards being implemented in coming years, according to Xie Ji, deputy director of the environmental protection department with the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).
As the world's most polluting country, these standards will make a significant contribution to reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. After implementing the plan, China will save 48 billion kWh of power per year and reduce GHG emissions by 48 million tons annually, according to the NDRC.
"Phasing-out inefficient incandescent lamps in China will not only promote lighting technology progress and lighting industry upgrading and optimization, it will also make a positive contribution for realizing China's energy conservation and emission reduction goal," said Christophe Bahuet, deputy country director of United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
Industry advancements are already happening here in the U.S. since President George W. Bush signed the EISA lighting standards into law in 2007. NEEP's Policy Outreach Manager, Natalie Hildt, highlighted the innovations to the lighting industry as a result of the lighting standards law in a recent piece in the Boston Globe.
"Since the law's passage, the industry has made rapid progress on both compact fluorescent and solid-state (or LED) bulbs. LEDs use a fraction of the power of incandescents to deliver the same amount of light, and could shave as much as $15 billion off electric bills by 2030. The first 40-watt equivalent and 60-watt equivalent LEDs only reached the market in 2010. According to Lowe's, the brightest bulb options for retail lighting basically doubled in the twelve months between July 2010 and July 2011."
Read the entire piece here.
Find out more about the benefits of the EISA Lighting Standards and the work NEEP and other organizations are doing to promote these standards through the
LUMEN Coalition.
