It is about time some logic was brought to bear on this hysteria about global warming.

Even if it is really happening (yes, yes the glaciers are melting but they have been doing so for hundreds of years) and even if some of the warming is caused by human activity, we need to take a measured response. If we assume that a good portion of the current global warming is caused by human activity, what are the major contributors to it? They would seem to be land clearing, coal mining and coal burning and oil consumption in all its forms (mainly for transport).

As far as fossil fuel consumption is concerned, transport and power generation would be the major uses. So if we decide that we must reduce fossil fuel use, we should be looking to more efficient transportation and more efficient power generation as well as increasing renewable energy sources such as solar, wind and hydro electricity. And of course, there is nuclear power generation.

We will also want to make major reductions on the consumption side but this is much harder. So the Federal government’s recent announcement of a proposed ban on incandescents seems like desperately wanting to be seen to be "doing something" (see the press release on page 11 of this issue, from Malcolm Turnbull, Minister for the Environment and Water Resources). By the government’s own figures, quoted in the press release, its overall effect on Australian greenhouse gas emissions will be tiny, estimated at 800,000 tonnes per annum from 2008 to 2012. Well whoopee.

As a proportion of domestic power consumption, lighting is quite small. If we halve the power used by domestic lighting, it will have very little effect on our overall power bills and by extension, on greenhouse gas emissions. For those that don’t already know, the major power use in homes is for heating, cooling and cooking. Any reduction in domestic power use due the proposed ban on incandescent lamps will be easily swamped by the increasing take-up of air-conditioning and plasma TVs.

Another factor to be considered is that most domestic lighting use is at night. That might seem blindingly obvious but the government apparently has not recognised why it might be important. The reason it is important is that most power usage at night is merely using the "spinning reserve" of our base-load power stations. You could switch all the lights off (if that was possible) and the base load power stations would still be spinning away, using just as much coal.

Just as this issue went to press there came the news that Europe was likely to adopt the same measure to ban incandescent lamps. They gave credit to Australia for coming up with the idea. Normally the European community is quite capable of coming up with all sorts of measures to restrict trade, economic activity and freedom but now they are about to adopt a stupid idea from Australia. Wonderful.

I wonder how Italian lighting companies will like the idea. Why should I be concerned about Italy in all of this? It turns out that most of Australia’s domestic light fittings (apart from fluorescent battens) come from either Italy or China. That is why we have ended up using such a diverse range of incandescent lamps, including all those Edison screw lamps. Much of that trade is going to be disrupted, isn’t it? Many Australian lighting retailers will also find the going pretty difficult too, unless they can quickly source a whole range of new light fittings which are compatible with compact fluorescent lamps. That’s just another of Malcolm’s unforeseen ramifications.

If governments really want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions they will need to do a lot more hard thinking and develop some real strategies to achieve it.

-Leo Simpson