An emergency ballast for a compact fluorescent lamp including a heater disposed adjacent the battery for maintaining the battery at a safe and effective operating temperature during the time which the lamp is powered by the normal AC power supply. Additionally, the ballast includes a charging control circuit which precludes charging of the battery when normal AC power is supplied to the ballast charging circuit during the time when the battery is below a temperature for safe and effective charging. The output of the emergency ballast provides supplemental cathode heating to improve the operating performance of the compact lamp in severely low temperature emergency operation.