Some people used the attic lines to run into the in-house fuse box, as they were fairly heavy gauge copper. I did not like them.

My grandparents’ farmhouse had those glass or ceramic insulators, which held the bare wires perhaps 2″ from the ceiling (or occasionally, the wall). As a young child I was scared to death of them; I knew electricity could be dangerous, but I didn’t quite understand that it wouldn’t simply leap from the wire to get me. Believe me, though, no licensed electrician put in those wires! In fact, that house burned down perhaps a year after the family sold it after my grandparents’ deaths… probably, IMHO, because of that wiring, though the family all said it was arson by the new owner, and maybe they were right.

That Victoria law sounds like something the electricians unions bargained for, or it was passed back the early days when you had to kill all the power to change a bulb. The earliest electric lights involved changing the entire fixture, and the wires were bare and run on glass or ceramic insulators. I’ve run across a few of those in the attics of old houses in New York. All of the switches were “knife-type” with bare copper bars and a ceramic grip. Pretty exciting to work with.

In Victoria Australia, only a licensed electrician is allowed to change a lightbulb.

Yup! Actually true!

If a normal person get’s killed or harmed changing a light bulb (even falling off the ladder or whatever), the insurance (if any) doesn’t have to pay a cent, and you may even get prosecuted!

This one, however isn’t true (any longer! It was, once!)
In Victoria Australia it is forbidden to wear pink hot pants after mid-day on a Sunday.

And… one for you Bryan:
In Miami, Florida, it is illegal to skateboard in a police station.

Legislators have nothing better to do, obviously. What a screwed up World we live in! *sigh*

the program we were involved in was one of several actually run by the energy companies. Of course, I was highly sus that an energy company would do anything for *free* and would want to reduce homes energy consumption! I’m not a cynic… just realistic!

Turns out, every home they do counts towards their carbon tax trading deal. So, the more homes they make efficient, the less they have to spend making the power plants more efficient, and the less they have to put towards green energy initiatives. And the World returned to normal, and I smiled knowing that I wasn’t in dreamland where corporations suddenly simply did something good and decent just because it was *the right thing to do*! I knew there had to be either a huge carrot or stick involved.

This is one of the programs. The vid on the front page is good, and mostly accurate.

Enviro Saver

HOWEVER… There is a price to pay for saving a bit of energy. The bulbs mostly use mercury, and if you break one, stop breathing, get the hell out, and wash your hands! Also, there was a story here early this year about the Chinese factories where they make most of the cfl globes:
Deadly cost of ‘green’ light bulbs

Yeah… I’m not a cynic. I wish I was sometimes. *sigh*

We just had all our bulbs changed from incandescent to the Phillips EnduraLED bulbs courtasy of a new Gov energy saving/greenhouse drive. Didn’t cost us a cent to replace 14 bulbs, (and a new high efficiency shower head which is also part of the water saving deal).

EnduraLED Solid State Lighting Retrofits

I must say, they are pretty darned good!

Phillips have the Genie energy saving bulbs bulbs that are supposedly guaranteed for 10,000 hours or 8 years. Supposedly