Bright Ideas: How To Steer Clear Of Mercury If Your Energy-Saving Bulb Breaks

The Compact Flourescent Lightbulb (CFL)--you know, the swirly-doodley one--is perhaps the greatest invention since . . . well . . . the original light bulb. An eco win-win, CFLs not only consume up to 75% less energy than their incandescent siblings, but also last 10 times longer, while saving hundreds--yes, hundreds--on your electricity bill.

Fact: You save about $30 or more in electricity costs over each bulb's lifetime. The average U.S. household has 45 light bulbs; replacing that number of 75-watt incandescent bulbs with CFLs would save $180 per year (Source: Energystar.gov).

According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), if just one million households replaced four traditional bulbs with four CFLs, we'd eliminate 900,000 tons of greenhouse gases. If every American household changed just one light bulb to a CFL, we would save enough power to light more than 2.5 million homes. That's doing far more than taking 3.5 million cars off the road . . . permanently!

To boot, CFLs are beautiful (they look like ice-cream). They fit into three-way bulbs, emit a pleasant, "soft white" glow, and are dimmable . . . bam-chica-wa-wa.

Despite sexiness and environmental excellence, it's important to know that CFLs do contain the harmful neurotoxin, mercury. While it is a small amount (4-5 mg per bulb, about the size of the tip on a ball point pen), you should take a bulb-break seriously by following the EPA's simple guidelines (paraphrased below and published on their website):

1) Open a window and leave the room for 15 minutes or more.

2) Carefully scoop fragments and powder with stiff paper, cardboard, or rubber gloves--do not use your bare hands! Duct tape can be used to lift small pieces and powder. Place bits in a sealed plastic bag. Do not use a vacuum or broom. This will only spread toxins.

3) Wipe the area clean with damp paper towel. When done, place the sullied towel in the same plastic bag.

4) Place the first bag in a second sealed plastic bag.

5) Call your local sanitation department for your district's non-hazardous disposal options. If it's after hours, call 1-800-CLEAN-UP or visit Earth911 and enter your zip in the top search engine.

Please don't just throw your bags in the trash. This is lazy and could put your garbage man in danger.

Though mercury is scary, there's no need to get your bulbs in a twist (I'm sorry, but I had to). Should one break, evil will not disperse, whereupon only a priest can exorcise the carpet. You won't need to call Ghostbusters or the National Guard either and you won't have to spend thousands on clean-up...that is a myth.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), individual CFLs don't have enough mercury to "pose a health threat" and contain less mercury than common household items like thermometers (500 mg) and older thermostats (3,000 mg).

The EPA also states that a power plant emits about 10 mg of mercury to produce the electricity needed to run one incandescent bulb. In comparison, a power plant emits only 2.4 mg of mercury to run a CFL bulb for the same amount of time. In other words, and ironically, compact fluorescents actually decrease mercury use.

Comments

[Shortyfuse]

Really. Thank you. Like you said someone had to do the job. Neither the company nor our gov. have put any money into safety and handling ads.

[CriminallySane]

The real benefit will come when LED lighting is affordable. No mercury, insanely long product life, and a fraction of the energy used even by CFLs.

[lunadove]

Thanks for the tips, it's good to know as my family has been replacing all of our bulbs for these.
Questions: How should one go about disposing of them in the first place? Well, for me, I can run down to my local sanitation department and have them disposed of with other potentially hazardous substances for a small price. What about people who don't have such convenient access and time? They can not be so good for landfills, so how do other people deal with this? Surely they will break in the garbage? I never really took the time to notice any warning as such on the packaging.
Just Curious!

[jvarga]

I know some places have cfl drop offs. My place of employment is really working on this "green thing", so I'm hoping that I can convince them to set one up here, so that at least the employees have an easy solution.

At this point I've only had one cfl die on me, the first one I bought several years ago, so I just have it in a cardboard box under my bathroom sink for now. Eventually that'll require a real solution :P

[OliviaZ]

Hi LunaDove,

Thanks for leaving this comment. I agree, general disposal is a tricky subject and very important. Some states allow you to throw out retired CFLs some don't. Either way, they're not good for landfills. I'd like to do a bit more research on this and get back to you with the easiest, most efficient, and least harmful way to dispose of retired bulbs . . . stay tuned and I'll post it in the comments section.

Thanks!
Olivia Zaleski

[JimReed]

If your solution involves driving across town and paying a fee, it would probably be usable by less than one percent of the population. How about the rest of us? I would think the only way that could work would be to set up a receiving box at every store that sells them, then an education campaign to tell people it is important to recycle. I could bring them back and drop them off when I make a trip to the store, but I doubt I could be bothered if it was more time consuming than that.

Also, what about non-compact flourescents? There are still some of them in use.
What about batteries? Should we set up another box for them?

[JimReed]

"Some states allow you to throw out retired CFLs some don't"

The ones that don't, what do they do to stop you?