There are lies.

There are damned lies.

And then there are lies told by the manufacturers of compact fluorescent lightbulbs.

It has been 11 years since I did a remodel of my home. Part of the endeavor was two exterior porch light fixtures. They specifically use CFL bulbs or compact fluorescent bulbs. You know the type. They have a pair of prongs on the bottom. The bulb has a swirl design of glass tubing.

I went with them as California was gearing up for an all-out ban of incandescent light bulbs by 2018.

If you’ve been following the multitude of edicts coming out of Sacramento over the past few years you are probably snickering. That’s because back in 2022 Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law legislation that bans the sale of CFL and linear fluorescent bulbs in California starting in 2025.

The only light bulbs you will basically be able to buy in California after that are LED lights.

This is not a rant against state edicts or a Luddite reaction to new technology.

I get the better energy efficiency and light output.

I’m not overly thrilled about having to eventually change out the light fixtures. But I won’t miss the quirky CFL bulbs. They are a bit precarious when trying to get one in the right way in the track/slots. That is especially true in a porch light placed high enough you need a step-stool to change the bulb that is upside down within glass that a five-year-old could barely fit their hand in.

I’ve never been thrilled about the warnings — especially the earlier ones — regarding the need to be careful not to break the bulb due to the mercury inside the glass.

The state essentially bet on CFL technology in a bid to reduce energy consumption and increase the efficient output of light.

And just like in many cases where special interests successfully lobby the government to favor one technology over another, they replaced one problem with another. They traded out higher energy consumption for more toxic mercury in a household.

Meanwhile, the private sector came up with a better technology on its own – LED lights.

What today’s “there-ought-to-be-a-law” tirade is about is planned obsolescence.

The CFL bulb by my front door has a rated life of 9.1 years based on being used 3.5 hours day. So does the one by my side door. The light bulb that went into service 12 years ago at my front door was made by General Electric.

The one I put into service seven months ago at the side door was the latest in a succession of GE bulbs.

At first, I had light sensors on both that turned the lights on at dusk and off at dawn. But those both sensors stopped working. For the first four years, the lights came on via the sensors. Then after the sensors went kaput I left the lights on 24/7. The front porch light is still the original light bulb. It was on easily eight hours daily for four years. Then for the past seven years it’s been on 24/7. Clearly, it exceeded the rating of 9.1 years with a daily use of 3.5 hours.

The side door light first went out seven years ago.

The replacement bulb – it cost a lot more than the original – was a new and “improved” GE product. It had a much brighter and whiter glow. And it was also rated for 9.1 years ago with daily use of 3.5 hours. That translates into one year and four months if the light was left on 24/7.

That was five bulbs go at a minimum of $9.95 at pop.

To be honest, it is right around what was promised although two didn’t make it a full year.

That said, the front light bulb is still working, roughly six times beyond its rated life.

It obviously was flawed. After all, this is a world where refrigerators, washing machines, and microwaves keep getting shorter and shorter lives the more technologically advanced allegedly have become. That might be a slight exaggeration but consider automobiles. The fewer parts and the fewer bells and whistles they had, the longer they lasted. Most people could also do their own maintenance.

Honestly, the tradeoffs of better efficiency, improved safety, and such are probably more than worth it. But still, you have to wonder how much of this has to do with the concept of planned obsolescence.

Durability — after all — reduces the impact on the environment by reducing the need to trash things sooner and sooner.

Some 50 miles west of Ceres in a Livermore fire station is a light bulb with its own live cam. It is “The Centennial Light Bulb,” so-called because it has been in use since 1901.

The hand-blown carbon-filament common light bulb was manufactured in the late 1890s by Shelby Electric Co. It has been on almost continuously since 1901 when it was donated to the Livermore Fire Department.

Originally rated as 60 watts, it is now emitting about four watts of light output after surpassing one million hours of “burning” electricity in 2015.

There are other Shelby light bulbs still in existence that also still work.

Now for the zinger.

Shelby Electric in 1914 couldn’t compete with massive investments firms were making in production. That was the year General Electric bought the company and ceased production on the Shelby light bulbs.

Gee, did I mention the newer fangled CFL bulbs that couldn’t last as long as original CFL bulbs in my porch light fixtures were GE made?

Kind of makes you wonder whether planned obsolescence is a business plan that more than a few firms actually embrace.

This column is the opinion of Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinions of The Courier or 209 Multimedia.