Energy policy lacks imagination

I FEEL the whole energy and global warming debate in Ireland, and our response to it, displays a complete lack of joined-up logical thinking.

Take, for example, the energy-saving light bulb. It is true that CFLs use only one-fifth of the electricity of a conventional incandescent light bulb to produce the same amount of light.

But where is the ‘wasted’ energy of the ordinary light bulb going — it is producing heat. Because we all heat our houses for a considerable part of the year, the energy really isn’t wasted at all. This is also true for the televisions, computers and all the other gadgets that we tend to leave on standby.