linearfluorescent.com

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It may not be something you notice day in and day out, but the advancement and modernization of linear fluorescent lighting has altered our lives in a very fundamental way. Nearly every building you walk into will be fluorescently lighted in some way. Most of us have spent twelve or more years in school, which means we have spent eight plus hours a day under the faint glow of linear fluorescent lighting. When we went home, we ate in the kitchen under linear fluorescent lighting, and even when we got up in the morning to ride the bus we usually rode under fluorescent lighting. How much time in a week do you spend in a grocery store, a mall, a gym? In a lot of ways, it's even scary to think about how much fluorescent lighting has changed our lives.

Linear fluorescent lighting operates on the principles of gas discharge. Electricity passes through the lamp and excites a gas known as mercury vapor. Excited by the gas, the dense, heavy mercury atoms bounce around and create ultra short wave UV (ultra violet) light. The UV light then causes the phosphor gas housed inside of the linear fluorescent lighting to 'fluoresce,' hence the name. This process causes the visible light that we all know and love (and sometimes hate).

 

 

Linear fluorescent lighting is a heavy departure from the familiar style of incandescent light bulb. Where a light bulb passes electrical current through a filament, linear fluorescent lighting operates very differently. A fluorescent lamp requires a heavily regulated flow of electrical current running through the lamp at all times; this is why a small crack or a weakening of the ballast makes the linear fluorescent lighting flicker on and off--that phenomenon that annoys us all so much.

Linear fluorescent lighting is popular because of its efficiency. For the same amount of power, linear fluorescent lighting creates a great deal more usable light than an incandescent lamp. This greatly reduces power costs over time, and is what allows stores, schools, and malls to provide so much light for so cheap. Although linear fluorescent lighting is more complicated than incandescent lighting and thus requires a greater initial cost, the increase in efficiency more than makes up for the higher initial cost of purchase.