Thoughts on designer lighting as a global catastrophe brews

Standing in the checkout this morning at Homebase. The woman in front of me was buying 50 watt halogen lightbulbs - just the kind in the light fittings I ditched from my kitchen when I moved house recently. Hasn't she heard of global warming? Hasn't she heard that lighting is one of the greatest energy consumers? Where has she been? What newspapers has she been reading, television watching? How ignorant can one be? How long will inertia reign? (Answer: until populations are finally forced by climatic catastrophe to migrate en masse, as environmental refugees.) Decided it was best to keep my mouth shut, thinking all the while that these things should be made illegal.

The fact is, that until someone starts manufacturing and marketing low-energy designer lighting, many people's shopping habits in light bulbs are not going to change. Not until the in thing, the fashionable, the desirable, the ultimate, comes in an ultra-cool, low-energy model will low-energy habits, low-energy shopping, low-energy anything become 'cool'. Because cool is all that counts, and the planet can go to blazes while we all burn up the megawatts, because everyone wants to be cool, cool, cool and show all their friends and neighbours how very cool they are.

So is anyone out there designing low-energy designer lighting? If so, say so, before it's too late. And if not, why not? - there's a fortune waiting to be made.