The article doesn’t mention that the efficiency of compact fluorescents is grossly overstated on the packaging.

General Electric energy smart 26 watt compact fluorescent lamps actually draw, if you read the tiny print on the base, 390 milliamps, which would be 46.8 watts at 120 volts. It takes nearly 47 watts to produce the same light as a 100 watt incandescent. 20 watts is consumed by the power supply. So this compact fluorescent as actually used is about 2 times as efficient as an incandescent rather than the 4 times implied by the silhouettes printed on the package showing“26 watt equals 100 watt”. You could argue that there is a historical explanation for this: fluorescent light power wattages have not included the energy consumed by the ballast or power supply in the past because the ballast was part of the fixture, not made by the same manufacturer as the bulb, and not changed with every lamp change.

A sticker on a recently purchased three-pack of these bulbs boasts “Saves $59 in energy”, based on 8000 hours at 10 cents per KWH. Evidently, they used 26 watts for this calculation, even though the bulbs are hardwired to their power supplies. If you do the math using the actual current draw you only save $42.56.

All compact fluorescents seem to be similarly mislabeled. Labeling that reflects the actual wattage used by the unit might encourage manufacturers to design more efficient power supplies as well as bulbs.

As punishment for their past dishonesty, manufacturers should be required to state the mercury content in absolute terms on the packaging. A bulb with 2 milligrams would contain about 1 one hundred thousandth of a mole of mercury, I think, or 6 X 10 to the 18th atoms. “Reduced Toxic Content”, the required label would proclaim, “Contains less than 6 million trillion toxic mercury atoms”. It’s not much really, they’re very small.