Industry calls for fluorescent guide prices

The price increase of phosphors caused by the soaring price of rare earth has obviously aggravated the chaos in the energy-saving lamp industry. The stability of the phosphor market has directly affected the stable development of the energy-saving lamp industry. Just last weekend, more than 60 domestic energy-saving lamp manufacturers and some of the phosphor suppliers began to discuss this industry issue at an internal conference convened by the China Lighting Association. At the meeting, many companies called on the country to introduce guidance prices for phosphors that have gone too far to regulate and develop the energy-saving lamp industry in an orderly manner. At the same time, many companies also expressed their hope to use the current price increase of phosphors to further increase the threshold of the energy-saving lamp industry to achieve market clean-up.

"Now the price of phosphors has gone up a bit too far!" This is the strongest point reflected by most participating energy-saving lamp manufacturers. “Originally, phosphors rose once every three years, but now they have gone up three times a year. At the beginning of the year, it was more than 300 yuan a kilogram, and it has now risen to 800 yuan!” It is understood that the cost of phosphors has accounted for about an energy-saving lamp. About one-third of the cost of raw materials, but now even reached 70%, so that companies miserable. In response, many companies have called on the government to proceed from the perspective of protecting the energy-saving lamp industry by properly interfering with the prices of phosphors, or introducing guidance prices.

While calling for regulation of phosphor prices, many companies also called for this opportunity to significantly increase the national standards for energy-saving lamps, which will not only increase the role of the industry in regulating the market, but also increase the efficiency of phosphor use and strengthen resource protection. It is understood that at present, the bottom line of the country's life setting for energy-saving lamps is 6,000 hours, but this standard has actually been on the low side. At present, the products of many leading domestic enterprises have reached 12,000 to 15,000 hours. According to the current technical strength of the domestic energy-saving lamp industry, reaching 30,000 hours is not impossible. An Lanpo, a senior industry expert, told the reporter that the longevity and shortness of life of energy-saving lamps depends largely on whether or not the lamps and ballasts match, and the amount of phosphor used is not significant. Therefore, improving the service life of energy-saving lamps is actually an important way to increase the utilization of phosphor resources. “After all, the country’s protective strategy for rare earth resources will not be relaxed, so more efficient use of phosphors will be the direction of the energy-saving lamp industry.”

Although this meeting last weekend was a closed-door conference within the lighting industry, the reporter learned that in addition to representatives from more than 60 domestic companies, officials from relevant departments of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the National Development and Reform Commission also attended. It is precisely because of this that the industry generally expects some of the issues raised at this meeting to be taken seriously by the government.