Goodbye to Conventional Lightbulbs
- And bye bye, Thomas Edison.

Conventional lightbulbs of 100W or more will be prohibited for sale in the EU from September 1. 2009. Then within 2012, while shops will be allowed to sell out their stock and householdings permitted to use the products until they cease to work, all consume of incandesent lightbulbs will eventually come to an end. This is according to a recent EU directive. With this directive the use of conventional lightbulbs, the revolutionary invention of Thomas Edison made some 130 years ago, has served its purpose and is being taken off the market. Source: Aftenposten.

Transit Pluto is crossing from the body of Edison's radix Mars and to the supposed position of natal Moon in his birth chart. At the same time Neptune has completed the transit of his Sun, and transit Jupiter and Chiron complete the configuration through their ellipses that continue into fall. It also sounds like a final flicker of Uranus in Pisces, too, before the planet of new sciences enter the sign of Aries with Jupiter during 2010.

Thomas Edison: born Feb. 11, 1847, Milan, Ohio .
Died Oct. 18, 1931

Sun 23AQ01, Moon 7CP54?, Mercury 19AQ45, Venus 6PI51
Mars, 1CP11, Jupiter 5GE50, Saturn 2PI04
Source: An Astrological Who's Who, by Marc Penfield.

selected quotes From Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThomasEdison

After many experiments with platinum and other metal filaments, Edison returned to a carbon filament. The first successful test was on October 22, 1879;[23] it lasted 40 hours. Edison continued to improve this design and by November 4, 1879, filed for U.S. patent 223,898 (granted on January 27, 1880) for an electric lamp using "a carbon filament or strip coiled and connected to platina contact wires".[24] Although the patent described several ways of creating the carbon filament including "cotton and linen thread, wood splints, papers coiled in various ways",[24] it was not until several months after the patent was granted that Edison and his team discovered a carbonized bamboo filament that could last over 1,200 hours.

Nearly all of Edison's patents were utility patents, which were protected for a 17-year period and included inventions or processes that are electrical, mechanical, or chemical in nature. About a dozen were design patents, which protect an ornamental design for up to a 14-year period. Like most patents, the inventions he described were improvements over prior art.

Edison was active in business right up to the end. Just months before his death in 1931, the Lackawanna Railroad implemented electric trains in suburban service from Hoboken to Gladstone, Montclair and Dover in New Jersey.

Edison born 11 Feb 1847 - Died 18 Oct 1931

Neptune discovered September 23, 1846

Pluto discovery date questioned as between Jan 23-29 1930 and reported on 13 Mar 1930 to Harvard Observatory.

I always think its interesting that Edison?s life span is basically the period between the discovery of Neptune and Pluto. Consider the funtion, Utility or Light, a means to work longer? Interesting I think, Also consider the make up of a light bulb, zinc, carbon, copper glass and fiber and its really a conduit, it doesn?t do anything by itself.

some of his patents were to illuminate or shed light on things, but also Edison was very big into Film... Illusion.

just some thoughts, Granny

PS, did you know that one of the byproducts of kerosene is Gasolene? and basically when some of the inventors of the day were working on making the first car type engines they were using a waste product.

the rest of course was dumped into rivers such as the Hudson destroying its ecology for years and eventually catching on fire...

I'm not happy with the disappearance of the old fashion lightbulb. It's light is so much warmer than the 'hard' light of the low energy light bulbs. They are in fact mini neon tubes with the same (unpleasant) type of light. Although they save energy they produce chemical waste because of the gases in the tube. A while ago I've bought dozens of old fashion light bulbs. Usually I use only one of them at the time in my house so I think I save enough energy.

Here some disadvantages http://gomestic.com/home/thinking-about ... ink-again/

Usually I encourage environmental issues but I don't like this one because it goes into the personal sphere. Car catalytic converters are things you won't notice in use. The difference in light is something you notice so this comes too close in my opinion.

This is the Directive on which the decision was made, the Eco-design directive:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/Lex ... 01:en:HTML

The text is in English but here you can choos another language:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/Result.do?arg0 ... mit=Zoeken

The directive dates from 30 june 2008. Here are the (noon UT) positions.

Date/Time: 2008.06.30 12:00:00 UTC (GMT - Delta T), JD = 2454648.000000
Sidereal Time: 06:35:42, Delta T = 68.5 seconds
Geocentric positions

Phase of Moon: 0.899 (0.000=New; 0.250=First 1/4; 0.500=Full; 0.750=Last 1/4)

Planet Longitude Latitude Right Asc. Declination
Sun 09 Cnc 03'39" 0?00'01" 06:39:27 23?07'50"
Moon 02 Gem 27'35" 5?01'21" 03:57:11 25?34'28"
Moon's Node 19 Aqr 13'35"R 0?00'00" 21:26:36 -15?03'26"
Apogee 25 Sgr 58'47"R - 4?08'15" 17:41:55 -27?30'51"
Mercury 17 Gem 35'05" - 3?23'01" 05:07:22 19?29'27"
Venus 14 Cnc 54'29" 0?50'31" 07:05:08 23?26'36"
Mars 29 Leo 17'52" 1?08'45" 10:07:19 12?47'31"
Jupiter 18 Cap 35'43"R - 0?10'23" 19:20:39 -22?19'15"
Saturn 04 Vir 28'06" 1?41'20" 10:27:51 11?26'39"
Uranus 22 Psc 39'05"R - 0?46'49" 23:34:15 - 3?37'59"
Neptune 23 Aqr 56'33"R - 0?20'11" 21:45:29 -13?51'30"
Pluto 29 Sgr 34'49"R 6?22'40" 17:58:15 -17?03'41"

Uranus is often related to electricity but apart from the square to Mercury, I don't really see a lot in these positions.

By the way, interesting considerations about Neptune/Pluto and Edison's life span Granny.

I'm one of those horrible candle people so I know what you mean about harsh light.

You can probably keep your bulbs buring longer if you keep the old fashioned ones for your reading lamp and use others in other light sources.

I think some of these things are less ecologically correct, than they are politically inspired. I'm sure the lighting manufacturers had some input, probably involving checkbooks. sigh...

Granny

Granny wrote:I always think its interesting that Edison?s life span is basically the period between the discovery of Neptune and Pluto.

That is interesting! It is a bit like Newton who came and left with Halley's Comet!
From Neptune to Pluto: That can certainly turn the lights on for a few! Wow!

In Norway they have on record a lightbuld that was fastened to the wall and turned on for the first time in 1936. Since then the 14W lightbulb with the brandname 'Pope' has been glowing ever since. The proud owner of the lightbulb is Torbj?rn Vikhammermo who relates to his grandfather not wanting to move it in 1958. Then it was already over 20 years old.

At Osrams technical department they call the phenomena a 'production fault'. "In the 30's lightbulbs were often hand made," says engineer Cato Johanessen to the newspaper V?rt Land. "So the length of the glow wire could vary; the longer the thread, the longer the bulb would live."

Source: http://www.vl.no/samfunn/article3408583.ece

Edison was also looking for built in replacement, a product to resell, there are ways ot make bulbs that dont wear out. there is one edison made that is still burning I do believe, its in the edison museum.

G.