You can't label eco-lights as dim, ugly and expensive any more

Energy-saving bulbs have come a long way in the last decade, and can save £140 each, says Matt Prescott

Stuart Jeffries' romantic eulogy to the common lightbulb, which he described as "the perfect union of technology and poetry", also noted that incandescent lightbulbs are much better at inefficiently burning your hands than efficiently producing light (Why the end of the lightbulb is a dark day for us all, 5 January).

But he then spoilt this observation by saying that this was a good thing. And, bizarrely, he then went on to say that a world without 100W lightbulbs - which would help Europe to avoid "30m tonnes of CO2 yearly, nearly half the 2006 greenhouse emissions of Sweden" - would be "dreary".

Supermarkets voluntarily decided to stop replacing their existing stock of 100W lightbulbs after New Year's Day. But despite the best efforts of the majority of the world's scientists, Jeffries has somehow managed to remain totally oblivious to, or unconcerned by, the hidden financial costs and environmental harm associated with keeping tens of millions of wasteful incandescent lightbulbs alight.

Lighting accounts for roughly 10% of the UK's electricity use, and represents one of the quickest and simplest ways of saving energy. Across Europe, wasteful lightbulbs keep the equivalent of 10 large power stations pumping out up to 50m tonnes of CO2 each year. Given the repeated failure of the UK and many other European countries to reduce their carbon emissions, the decision to phase out incandescent lightbulbs is, in fact, an exciting and vital first step.

Jeffries complained that eco-lights were "dimmer, colder, uglier and often more expensive". While this certainly used to be the case in the 1970s, and perhaps even the early 2000s, this is not a fair reflection of the smaller bulbs - giving better value and brighter, warmer and quicker light - now available. Energy-saving compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) are not perfect, but the best designs can cost as little as 81p - and each save £9 per year in electricity and £60 to £140 over their lifetime.

Fortunately, lighting manufacturers now understand that change is inevitable and have started to produce far better products. I've recently started using a 4W LED table lamp to replace a 40W lightbulb, which is dimmable, instantly bright and contains zero mercury - and I look forward to other brighter LED-based lamps becoming cheaper and more widely available.

Of course, compact fluorescent lamps should be made 100 times easier to recycle, and medical exemptions should be offered to those who are visually impaired or suffer migraines; but these issues are totally solvable and shouldn't be used to delay necessary change.

So there is absolutely no scope for Jeffries's final slur of "eco-triumphalism", as there is still so much to do: phasing out lightbulbs is not nearly enough on its own.

Unlike Jeffries, I'm pretty sure that Archimedes would have considered the decision to phase out lightbulbs a real "eureka moment" for humankind, and I sincerely hope it will provide a firm launch pad for all the other, much bigger, improvements that we need to make to our gadgets, cars and homes.

Matt Prescott is director of Ban the Bulb