Plasma Display Coalition Says Big Screens Not That Bad

This is toooooooooo green for me.

I like my TVs oversided. I agree with the gas/oil reduction but dont mess with my TV.

Really, they're not.

My 3 year old, 42" Toshiba plasma TV uses 1 watt when it's "Off". And it uses about 170 watts when it's on. Checking the manual for our old 30" CRT TV (which now belongs to my father in law), it uses about 150 watts.

But I also couldn't help but notice that the old TV has about 50 lbs of lead in it. Even if the electronics in the new one are from the bad old days, the amount of lead in it is a tiny fraction of that.

And apparently I lucked out, because one of the links in this story says Toshiba doesn't use Nitrogen Triflouride, the biggest reason Treehugger stated in that article for the evils of plasma TVs. I did on the other hand, make a point of buying a TV that was Energy Star rated.

The thing as I see it, is that Treehugger and the left-leaning green crowd is railing against "excess". Sometimes this is warranted. Sometimes it is not. I've met many greenies that use this philosophy to hide their obvious jealousy for the things they want, but can't afford to buy. This is an attitude that Treehugger.com should avoid at all costs, because it's pretty transparent to everyone else.

So repeat after me: Big screen TVs and other icons of capitalist acheivement are not inherently evil. The way they are be manufactured might be evil, but that can be fixed. That's why we should be lobbying for changes in legislation.

I went into a TV editing suite in Bristol a few weeks ago and was surprised that they had old fat TVs (just like mine!) and they told me the colours just aren't good enough on flat screen TVs...
So next time you see a fat TV in someone's home you'll knowl they're a TV connoisseur!

How do other forms of big screens (LCD, DLP, Projection) perform compared to Plasmas in terms of efficiency?

LCDs are far more efficient than plasmas.

@ Wee recycling
To get good color definition out of an LCD (don't know about plasma) you need to get an 8 bit LCD. These are able to display 16m colors, which should be good enough for the type of work an editing studio does. Unfortunately, they are much more expensive than the more common 6 bit LCDs.

@ CoolProducts
LCDs almost always have the lowest power usage of any of the types of displays for a given size. They use cold cathode backlights which produce little waste heat (always the "inefficient" part of light bulbs). The biggest drawback is that blacks aren't as "black" as they should be. Plasma TVs can use as much as three times the power of an equivalent-sized LCD, although efficiency gains seem to be closing that gap. DLP and LCoS rear-projection sets have lots of drawbacks vs. LCD. First, they draw more power, usually using a 120w or 200w bulb for their projector. Second, they take up more space, since they're deeper. Third, that light bulb has to be replaced every 2000-4000 hours at a cost of $200-400, whereas LCDs (and Plasmas) last 30,000 hours. If you watch just 2 hours of TV a day, you'd have to replace the bulb in 3 years. The upside is you get a bigger screen for the same price.

Once OLED displays scale in size and come down in price, they'll beat all of these technologies: they use less power than even LCDs, they have brilliant color displays including true black, they're thinner than even LCDs, they're cheaper to produce, and they last as long or longer than LCDs and plasma sets. So, if you just bought something, hold on to it for five years until OLED sets come out at reasonable prices.

We should, of course, encourage manufacturers to make their products as efficient as possible, and to push themselves in that regard. We should also encourage models whose manufacture is less poilluting, and that are designed for eventual recycling. We should encourage consumers to purchase TVs that are an appropriate size for the room in which they are putting them.

However, there is nothing inherently bad about consuming any particular amount of energy. As long as that energy is coming from fossil fuels, we have a problem. But there are plenty of clean, abundant energy sources that we could be using which would have minimal environmental impact even at levels of consumption much higher than we use today.

The PDC points out that the larger models can cost as little as $4 a month to operate, which, to me, still seems like a lot to pay to flip on the TV.

If you can't afford this, you need a job.

Philips actually makes a 42" LCD ""Eco TV" which is VERY power friendly. My old 20" CRT tv consumed about 65-95watts, the eco tv which I bought a few months ago (from Amazon) consumes 65-75 watts and is MUCH MUCH bigger with a picture that can't even be compared.

Most LCD's and Plasmas of similar size consume 250-400 watts.

Ernie, that was one of the most intelligent and civil comments I have seen in a long time. I like my energy star plasma. It uses more energy then a cave painting, but then it does more too. Technology got us here, it can get us out of this mess.

The new LED array backlit LCDs will be the ultimate for a while. The individual LEDs behind the LCDs can be adjusted to reduce or increase the brightness to different parts of the pictures, which allows for amazing blacks and whites on the same picture.

Newer CCFL lit LCDs all have dynamic control of the brightness too. But that's for the whole screen, not a small section like the LEDs. By only illuminating the sections that need light you're saving power, heat and making a better picture. LEDs are also mercury free. Cost is very high, for now.