CFL's are safe unless you break one. Then you have to call out a HAZMAT team practically. They contain vaporized mercury
About CFL efficency and lamp life. There are HUGE differences from one manufacturer to the next. A cheap chinese knock off lamps life may actually a little less than a regular incandescent with a nasty fall of of lumen output in the first 100 hours or som (some nearly 50%). A good quality CFL will leas years and only fall off some 20-30% output over its lifetime. Like everything else you get what you pay for.
As to the CRI (Color Rendering Index) fluorescents are typically closer to the blue green than the red spectrum. Although they can be had up to nearly 5,000K color temprature (nearly white light).
But honestly CFL's are a passing fad soon to be upstaged by LEDs.
About the EMI or electromagnetic 'waves' try this little trick. Unplug your amplified speakers, now touch it to your fingertip. That bzzzzt you hear is 60 cycle 'waves' coupled through your body. Its everywhere cannot be avoided and been that way for decades. The long term effects are as yet really un known but it seems to be begnine.
I'm all over this topic as its a part of what I do for a living.
Any questions I'm the expert
