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The editors at Fast Company think Wal-Mart is about to bring about a real reduction in the use of energy. In cooperation with GE, Wal-Mart has begun a year-long initiative to replace at least one incandescent lightbulb for each customer. That's 100 million bulbs that will go out of service. In their place we'll be screwing compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs). Why am I writing about this? It's one ambitious project, that's why!

CFL sales are projected to reduce carbon emissions equivalent to taking 1.3 million cars off the road

The numbers are impressive. In FC's article How Many Lightbulbs Does It Take to Change the World? One. And You're Looking at It¹, CFLs last anywhere from 8,000 to 12,000 hours. This compares to 1000 hours for an incandescent. That's 8 to 12 bulbs taken out of service for each CFL. Each CFL bulb uses about 28% the energy of an equivalent 60 watt incandescent. At a savings in energy of $0.46/month the CFL pays back in 5 months. (If you buy the bulbs in an 8-pack at Sam's Club the payoff will come in 3 months.) It continues to generate savings for another 8-10 years! But that's not the best part.

If Wal-Mart succeeds, then their CFL sales are projected to reduce carbon emissions equivalent to taking 1.3 million cars off the road, or not burning 29,900 railcars of coal.

Now on to the project side of this. This initiative started by chance, like many company initiatives do. FC tells the story of a buyer who wondered what could be saved by replacing the incandescents in the ceiling fans with the fluorescent bulbs he saw in hotel rooms. Each lamp takes four bulbs. Each store has about 10 models on display. There are 3,230 stores selling fans. Wal-Mart alone was paying $6 million annually for the electricity for those incandescent lights. The buyers continued to wonder. And wonder some more. For me, this story is about a group of people that started with a lightbulb buyer to GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt, all considering just what might be possible.

Wal-Mart is demonstrating what is possible when someone wonders and others listen and act.

Projects like this take a bunch of selling…ideas, not light bulbs. The implications turn out to be huge. By committing to provide the CFLs GE was also committing to forgo the sales of 600 million incandescents over the next few years. That would require shutting down at least one factory. It's a decision that GE eventually made.

More decisions and plans had to be made. Displays had to be created. Education programs for shoppers were developed. Shelf stocking in all 3,230 stores had to change. These are just some of the actions that we know about that had to be coordinated. Wal-Mart didn't tell FC their whole plan. I predict we'll be compelled to make the switch. Even non-Wal-Mart shoppers will buy CFLs, and many will become Wal-Mart shoppers in the process.

Selling CFLs are not like designing and coding software, nor like designing and building buildings, nor new product introductions. No, it's much bigger. Selling 100 million CFLs will take legions of people acting in concert so the bulbs are ready for you and me and then we'll replace our bulbs. While this may not save the planet, Wal-Mart is demonstrating what is possible when someone wonders and others listen and act.

1. The article will be available online to everyone on Sept 1, 2006. Subscribers and newsstand buyers can get access now by using the access code "FCSEPTCUST". [ ⇑ back ]