It Only Takes One Australian to Kill a Lightbulb

In a dramatic move on the 22nd of February, the Australian Prime Minister, John Howard moved to ban incandescant light bulbs by the year 2010. This makes Australia the first country to take nationwide action to ban inefficent incandescant light bulbs. The Australian government believes that the ban will slash carbon emissions Down Under by over a million tons by 2012.

Howard's decision is a bit of a surprise, as for the past decade his refusal to sign up to the Kyoto protocol has ostracised Howard from the hub of the growing movement against global warming.

Bill Turnbull, Environmental Minister is said: "It's a little thing but it's a massive change. If the whole world switches to these bulbs today we would reduce our consumption of electricity by an amount equal to five times Australia's annual consumption of electricity."

By contrast, bold action in the other great nations of the world is somewhat lacking. We heard on EcoGeek earlier this month that legislators in the state of California and New England are looking to ban incandescant bulbs, whilst in Britain, Tony Blair changed the light outside his house from a incandescant bulb to a energy-saving bulb, in a bold move to provide weak symbolic support to the cause.

Despite this move, Australia will still produce 561 million tonnes of CO2, if this plan makes the 4 million ton savings in CO2 which are hoped for.