Village offers free light bulb grab
- Published: November 14, 2012
Thousands of compact fluorescent light bulbs will be given away this week as part of a Village-funded energy-efficiency program. Local electric utility customers can pick up a bag of free light bulbs during office hours on Nov. 14–15 at the Village Utility Office on the first floor of the John Bryan Community Center. The office is open 10 a.m.–2 p.m. on Nov. 14, and 10 a.m.–6 p.m. on Nov. 15.
Each household or business will get at least five free light bulbs, including two 60-watt equivalent bulbs, two 75-watt equivalent bulbs and one 100-watt equivalent bulb.
Since compact fluorescents use 75 percent less energy than incandescents and last up to 10 times as long, customers will reap significant savings on their utility bills, according to Carrie Hoover, a spokesperson with Efficiency Smart, the group organizing the giveaway.
Free light bulbs are one of the many local initiatives of the Efficiency Smart program, now in its second year of a three-year effort to shave 490 megawatt-hours off of Village energy use. In 2009, the Columbus-based Efficiency Smart was tasked with spending the $181,500 the Village was fined for purchasing power from a polluting coal-fired power plant in Southeastern Ohio. That money, resulting from a Clean Air Act violation at the AMP Gorsuch plant near Marietta, was to be used to help the community meet a 1.63 percent per year electricity reduction goal.
To date, the Village has met 82 percent of its energy reduction goal, according to a report from Efficiency Smart.
More on this story appears in this week’s issue of the Yellow Springs News.
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Only if that $181,500 was money that was just sitting there mouldering might those 5 newfangled light bulbs be considered “free”.