Greenpeace puts up reminder signpost opp Philips India office

New Delhi, May 17 (UNI) Continuing its campaign to have incandescent bulbs banned, a Greenpeace Climate Patrol team today erected a 'Climate Hazard Information' signpost in front of the Philips Lighting headquarters at Gurgaon.

The signpost highlights details of the number of incandescent bulbs produced by Philips, the amount of carbon dioxide emissions from these bulbs and the deadly climate impact of such emissions, said Vinuta Gopal, Climate and Energy Campaigner Greenpeace.

"The signpost is a constant reminder to Philips of the threat that the incandescent bulbs they produce and market pose to the environment and people of the country", she said.

"It is time for Philips to translate their "grave" concerns for the environment into real action and present concrete measures on how and when they will phase out the incandescent bulb" she added.

The signpost is on the lines of the Hazardous Waste signs that every production unit dealing with toxic materials is required to put up at the gates of their production facilities by the Pollution Control Board.

'The Greenpeace Guide to Climate Safe Lighting', a ranking guide for the Indian lighting industry, that was released in Mumbai last month listed manufacturers whose incandescent bulbs are responsible for the highest quantity of avoidable carbon dioxide emissions.

Philips, which sells the most number of incandescent bulbs in the market, outnumbered its competitors by a huge margin and was ranked the number 1 climate criminal followed by Surya and Bajaj who stood second and third respectively.

"Since the release of the ranking guide, Philips has stated to the media that they would like to switch to energy efficient lighting but have however fastidiously refused to come up with any clear timelines on how they will implement these noble intentions" said Vinuta, emphasising that "given that we only have an 8 year window within which to act, the time for merely expressing concern is long over." The Greenpeace Guide estimated that Philips alone is responsible for net avoidable carbon dioxide emissions of 48013.56tons of carbon dioxide per day in India as they are the leading manufacturer of incandescent bulbs in the country.

The Greenpeace activist called on the lighting industry, especially the biggest contributors to climate change Philips, Surya and Bajaj, to take responsibility and immediately announce a plan to phase out the hazardous incandescent bulbs by 2010.

''This will not only solve a part of the country's power problem but also significantly reduce India's carbon dioxide emissions,'' she said.

The green body has launched the 'Ban the Bulb' campaign last month in India to cut greenhouse gas emissions and fight climate change across India. It called for replacing with compact fluorescent lamps (CFL), a move it says will help India save 12,000 megawatts of electricity a year -- or four percent of carbon dioxide emissions.

Incandescent bulbs lose 90 per cent of the energy that goes into them as heat while a CFL bulb uses about 20 percent of the electricity to produce the same amount of light.

Every watt of electricity produced involves carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to greenhouse gases and global warming, because the major source of electricity in India is coal-fuelled power plants, said Greenpeace in a statement.

UNI