Global CFL Sales at All-Time High
Global CFL Sales at All-Time High
Global sales of compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) continue to grow rapidly. Anual growth rates must still be counted in two-digit numbers.
Global sales of compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) rose to 240 million in 1995, continuing the strong growth that has characterized this energy-saving technology since 1988. Sales in 1995 were 15 percent above those in 1994.
North America and Western Europe continue to account for more than half of global CFL sales. US sales increased by 10 percent in 1995, while those in Europe grew by 8.5 percent. However, CFLs are rapidly gaining in popularity in the former Soviet Union and developing countries, where sales growth rates are significantly higher than in the established markets. In 1995, sales increased by half in Eastern Europe and by 31 percent in developing countries. Latin America and the Asia Pacific region now account for 17 percent of global CFL sales.
As CFL sales increase, new manufacturing facilities are appearing around the world. In 1992, the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy reported that production was limited to the United States, Western Europe, Brazil, Mexico, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, China, and Sri Lanka. Since then, manufacturing plants have also opened in India, Thailand, Indonesia, Hungary, Poland, Russia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan.
Due in part to lower labor costs, production is shifting from industrialized countries to developing ones and to the former Soviet republics. China has now overtaken the United States as the world's single largest CFL producer. In 1994, China produced some 60 million CFLs, while US production was only 34 million.
GOVERNMENTS PROMOTE CFLs
Government demand-side management (DSM) efforts, designed to reduce energy use and save money through energy efficiency and conservation, are responsible in part for the rapid growth of CFL use in many developing countries. China's five-year economic plan for 1996-2000, for example, identifies lighting in general and CFLs specifically as crucial elements of the government's energy efficiency efforts. In Indonesia, the state-owned utility plans to install some 200 000 CFLs in residences around the country between 1995 and 1997.
Thailand has an even more ambitious CFL plan: their Charge on the Bill program, in which customers pay for CFL purchases through incremental charges on their utility bills, will distribute some 1.5 million units, with an additional several hundred thousand targeted for low-income households. Other pilot utility DSM programs aimed at disseminating CFLs are under way in the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Honduras, among others.
As more homes around the world become electrified, demand for lighting will increase. Currently, some 2 billion people around the world lack access to electricity. Demand in developing countries is expected to rise by 7 percent annually through the nineties. Some countries, such as India, project annual growth rates of at least 10 percent over the next decade. Yet the economic and environmental costs of generating additional electricity are prohibitively high.
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMS
Energy-efficient technologies such as CFLs offer an appealing alternative to the construction of expensive new power plants. A typical 18-watt CFL provides the same light output as a 75-watt incandescent light bulb and lasts about 10 times as long, ultimately saving a typical US$33 in electricity and lamp replacement costs over its lifetime. Replacing a 75-watt incandescent with an 18-watt CFL will also keep 267 kilograms of carbon and approximately 7.5 kilograms of sulfur dioxide out of the atmosphere over the life of the lamp.
As more countries begin to recognize the benefits of CFLs and as international development institutions begin to promote their use in the Third World, strong growth in global sales can be expected to continue. The World Bank and International Finance Corporation, with funding from the Global Environment Facility (GEF), currently manage energy-efficient lighting projects focused on CFL dissemination in Mexico and Poland. The bank is also considering expanding the pilot projects to additional countries in the near future using either GEF or conventional financing techniques.
Toni Nelson
Toni Nelson is a researcher at the Washington DC-based Worldwatch Institute. The article was written with IAEEL data input and was published in the Institute's 1996 Vital Signs report, an annual comprehensive global overview of political, economic, social, energy and environment key indicators.