Trump’s next great idea
❝ It’s one thing to oppose the grandiose “Green New Deal”…It feels like something totally other to oppose narrow regulations that could advance the campaign to swap out incandescent light bulbs for light-emitting diode (LED) lighting, a small, practical step that, multiplied into the millions, would passively remove a healthy chunk of energy-eating pollution over time…
Are all Republicans as stupid as Trump or simply more thoroughly owned by cretins who want to return to the days of coal-fired everything on Earth?
❝ A Washington Post editorial argued, “Swapping out all the old incandescent bulbs across the country would save an astonishing amount of energy, which would translate into big savings for consumers and less pollution over time. But Republicans stymied the Obama administration’s efforts to pursue this policy, which has no downside, and the Trump administration is now using its power over federal efficiency standards to extend the rollback.”
It was in 2007 that Congress mandated a shift toward the LED light bulb. As manufacturers invested in manufacturing lights that use these updated technologies, the prices dropped, the bulbs improved and consumers saw lower energy bills for doing very little.
❝ By 2020, all bulbs were supposed to be LEDs, including bulbs for candelabras, recessed lighting, heavy-duty applications and others added in the latter days of the Obama era. The Trump administration moved last week to eliminate those additions, despite the fact that the 2020 standards would have saved consumers billions of dollars per year and 140 billion kilowatt-hours in energy waste—the equivalent to the output of 45 coal-fired power plants—in 2025…
Sounds to me like the mostly correct assumption that Trump supporters are ignorant, prefer their ignorance over progress even if change would save money and aid a healthier lifestyle…governs the Republican boffins afraid of alienating the clods whose admittedly distorted votes put him in office.
Call it the ignoranus vote`
Eideard 
“They Used to Say Whale Oil Was Indispensable, Too” (NYT Aug 2008) https://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/03/nyregion/03towns.html
In the US, whale oil was used in cars as a constituent of automatic transmission fluid until it was banned by the 1973 Endangered Species Act. (“Transmission Problems in Cars Linked to Ban on Whale Killing” NYT 1975) https://www.nytimes.com/1975/04/17/archives/transmission-problems-in-cars-linked-to-ban-on-whale-killing.html
The Trump administration on Wednesday announced that it will roll back requirements for more energy efficient light bulbs, a set of rules that could lead to increased green house gas emissions that accelerate global warming.
The filing from the Energy Department would prevent new efficiency requirements from implementation on Jan. 1 under a previous law passed during President George W. Bush’s administration in 2007. That law phased out inefficient incandescent and halogen bulbs, and was passed with bipartisan support in Congress.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/04/trump-rolls-back-requirements-on-energy-saving-light-bulbs.html
“DOE received comments from the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA), Westinghouse Lighting, Signify North America Corporation (Signify), GE Lighting, and the American Lighting Association (ALA) agreeing with DOE’s statement in the February 2019 NOPR that the backstop standard in 42 U.S.C. 6295(i)(6)(A)(v) has not been triggered since the Secretary has not determined whether to amend GSIL standards under 42 U.S.C. 6295(i)(6)(A)(iii), and so there is no obligation yet to publish a rule in accordance with the 42 U.S.C.6295(i)(6)(A)(i) –(iv).” https://s3.amazonaws.com/public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2019-18940.pdf
“Trump Bends the Facts on Lightbulbs” : a review of each of Trump’s key claims and what’s happened with lightbulb energy-efficiency standards over the last decade or so.
FactCheck.org® / The Annenberg Public Policy Center (9/19/19) https://www.factcheck.org/2019/09/trump-bends-the-facts-on-lightbulbs/