Compact Fluorescent Light Bulb Recycling

[stickedU]

Mercury is not bad for humans, I saw this common belief debunked. Its actually good in small amounts through extended time. UV too, small amounts over extended time.

[stevenabb]

BullCRAP!!! Compact Fluorescent Bulbs don't last 8x a regular light bulb... They are being so cheaply made in China now, they last about 2x times of a regular bulb.God help you if it breaks in a kids bedroom... Kids will be kids and may not tell you for a week they broke a lightbulb while playing in Mercury for a week. So now we have our toxic bulbs... you do realize 95% of these will end up in landfills at 4 ~ 5 mg per bulb and millions and millions of bulbs it's a toxic train wreck...BAD

[47f0]

@stevenabb - if you have no clue that your kids are playing in broken glass, well, you have no clue. Can't help you there, mate. I find all this pantie wetting about the 4mg of Hg in CFLs funny as hell, as for decades we've had 45-60 mg of Hg in bog-standard 48" fluorescents, which are commonly used in residential kitchen and garage fixtures, and are the standard for lighting at work and schools. Think your kids may not tell you? I promise, your school janitor won't fess up to breaking a bulb.

[stevenabb]

@47f0 - What is that about "moving into another trailer"? What trailer? We live in a 3,200 SQ house... Please don't assume everyone is as poor as you. If your hunky~dorry with putty these Mercury bulbs in your kids bedrooms, go in peace. As for your comment about "pantie wetting" actually, your wife and I are not dry humping anymore, she is going bare with me so I am not making a mess of her undies... Thanks dorkie for slipping in a wierd comment like that.

[47f0]

@stevenabb - I don't care if you live in Buckingham palace - you can move away from it far more easily than you can move away from a toxic environment - got tickets for the bus to Mars? But in the end, the only refutation you have is a juvenile, "oh, dude, I totally banged your wife." Brilliant. With a level of genius like that, no wonder you're a clueless fuck who doesn't know what his kids are tearing up, and prefers to keep his mercury hidden in his air, water and breakfast cereal.

[noreaga12326]

@47f0 you're probably one of those idiots who think that humans are responsible for global warming. Go do something useful with ur life instead of posting non-sense on utube, old man. your grandchildren are waiting to use the computer.

[999Atwood]

Thanks for the info Jerry Garcia!

[rainbowsalads]

why is it that the energy saving bulb manufactures do not sell these bulbs in a special box that that the bulb should also be returned via a free-post back to the manufacturer? if they continue to sell these , it should be easy and free to recycle.

[HailedJunk]

y dont u donated burned out fluorescent light bulbs to wrestling companies to use idk i gave a lighting company 5$ for a huge box that they were gonna recycle.

[PhuqueU]

LEDs last lomger EinSTEIN, and have no Mercury.

Fluorescents also emit radiation! Look it up! Mr Irresponsible!

[LightningT5]

But are CFL Lamps really a "Stop-Gap" Alternative to Incandescent light bulbs, I have seen some LED Light have small fans inside them to keep them cool, which is essential for this type of bulb. Also LED Lights are priced quite highly for a bulb which is equivilent to a 60 Watt incandescent light bulb, through I'm guessing the price will eventually fall.

[untypoed]

You are boring to listen to.

[owmyanus]

This might be really useful to anyone needing to dispose of Fluorescent tubes or CFL bulbs. Wal-Mart has a special bin in their Claims area that they use to send broken or burnt out fluorescent bulbs.

If you take your CFL bulbs or Fluorescent tube bulbs and ask they will more than likely be happy to help you out and dispose of the bulbs for you.

This bin is fairly new...at least in the store I work at.

If you cannot find a safe disposal site, try Wal-Mart.

[tipoomaster]

My dad got some cheap "Sunbeam" CFL's from the dollar store, they suck. he also got some more expencive and better phillips ones, but we have some of the dollar store ones still in the house (the ones that didnt burn out in the first month). they have me worried though since i read that cheap CFL's can cause fires and leak hazardous amounts of mercury into your home, does anyone recognise the "Sunbeam" brand name? is it safe?

[btube56]

I just had a sunbeam 24 W CFL sizzle out and we frantically tried to find the source of the awful burning wire smell. Three hours later the house still smells, and so does the base of the CFL. Is this a normal occurance? The Ballast is not blackened but it must have been burning inside.

[livewiser]

sadly they do not last as advertized costing more than saved on electricity. Also, they are toxic and only manufactured in china probably because they are so toxic. Instead try turning your lights off when they are not needed.

[bdrowe]

Home Depot now will take back all old CFLs. So when you go to buy the replacement, take the old one with you.

[redeyes101]

I think the new bulbs are great!

Though my mother thinks the color that they give off is ugly. (I think she's full of it)

[kgwickings]

the average person is going to throw them in the trash--like they do with batteries.

[redeyes101]

There is so little amount of mercury that even if the light bulb shattered in your house, you wouldn't be in hardly any danger.

Though I heard someone freaked out about a bulb breaking in her house and she called someone to remove it costing her $5,000.

[12stringsforme]

Comments like this are extremely irresponsible. Do some fucking research before you spout off, know-nothing.

[CleanGreenLight]

The average household has 50 light bulbs, with an average life of 10 years. Each CFL bulb contains 20mg of mercury, so the mercury waste from one household is 1 gram every decade. With a toxic TLV of 25 microgrammes per cubic metre, that is potentially 40,000 cubic metres of toxic mercury vapour.

There are 30 million households in the UK alone, so that represents 30 metric tonnes of mercury released every decade, enough to pollute over 1000 cubic kilometres per decade.

[CleanGreenLight]

Compact fluorescent light bulbs release highly toxic mercury vapour when broken. The TLV (Threshold Limit Value) is only 25 micrograms per cubic meter (OSHA).

It will cost your local authority dearly to provide for their disposal.

They are not dimmable, they are slow to warm up, have a tendency to flicker, and have a poor color.

They will not save much electricity. If you normally need to heat your home, the so-called 'waste' heat from conventional bulbs helps heat your home.

[KnightChatX]

Mercury is also in air conditioner sliders.

[KnightChatX]

And if it doesn't work when ya get it or is too dim take back to store where ya got it and replace it.

[fcharrua]

How can you say that you will save allot of money? My electricity bills are 80$ / 2 months in the summer, and go up to 300$ / 2 months in the winter. So, I think that any effort to TRIM my energy consumption should come WITHOUT the adding of mercury to the enviornment.

[47f0]

Ummm - you lose. CFLs LOWER the amount of environmental mercury. Current power production puts about 10-15mg of mercury into the environment powering incandescent bulbs over the lifetime of one CFL - which contains only 4mg of mercury. Even if you disposed of your CFLs by tossing them in the air and shooting them, you'd still have a net reduction in environmental mercury.

[vmelkon]

Why not go for a solution that doesn't involve mercury. Why not use LED lights?

[47f0]

Great question. Because LEDs suck. No, they don't suck for everything. I have an LED desk lamp. All my flashlights except for one are LED. BUT... The LED vendors play games, specifically with a measurement called lumens. Lumens are really pretty simple - the overall output of a bulb. But the LED vendors use numbers based on "field lumens" or "area lumens" basically hiding the fact that their product produces less overall light, but is comparable within a certain area.

cont...

[47f0]

... cont. When you compare real lumens, overall light per watt, LEDs still have the edge over CFLs, but only barely. Hopefully that will change - soon. In the meantime, there's the cost to contend with. If you can't sell the environmental reduction in mercury that CFLs offer at their price, LEDs are going to continue to be a hard sell at $30 to $90 bucks a bulb. And that long life you get from LEDs? Don't count on it.

cont...

[47f0]

...cont. LEDs designed for household use require electronics in their base just as CFLs do. And they plug into the same crummy power that's subject to voltage spikes and lightning hits - so the LED itself may be fine - but if the circuits in the bottom of the bulb are fried, you still have a dead bulb. So - for specific uses, yes, LEDs, absolutely. But they just aren't anywhere near a replacement for a generic bulb - yet.

cont...

[47f0]

...cont. In the meantime, CFLs are an option that anyone can afford now, they do reduce environmental mercury, not to mention other pollutants from power generation, and they compare in lighting very well with conventional bulbs, with a payback time that LEDs aren't even close to touching, currently. Now - why all the panic about Hg in CFLs, when you went to school, work and shop under conventional fluorescent tubes that have 10x the mercury? Just curious.

[vmelkon]

I suppose you have a point for USA users. I don't know where my original post is but in Canada (Quebec), it is encouraged to use these CFL and the power plants are all hydro power except for 1 which is nuclear. I will one day contact them and see why they want us to use those CFLs.

[47f0]

People have some notion that if they live next to Niagra that all their power is green. In actuality, you have no idea where any particular electron moving down your wires originated. As wacky as it sounds, even countries (like Canada and the US) share power - you're from Quebec - remember the August 2003 blackout? It's all connected, and when customers mistakenly think "Hey, it's hydro, burn all you want" they're burning power that could offset the need for coal power elsewhere.

[fcharrua]

In quebec, we use hydro-electricity, no mercury there. Also, if you have children, do you risk exposing them to the 4mg of hg in a CFL? It's your gamble. Also, light bulbs use up a small fraction of our power. If you want to save energy, try drying your clothes less, using less hot water, and cooking large batches of food at a time. Also, think about the fuel that gets used shipping goods from china to america.

[47f0]

Why do you respond to a post you did not read? Your grid and ours interconnect and supply each other. Burning more of your clean hydro electricity means less is available in coal-burning parts of the grid, which means more coal, more environmental mercury. My grandkids are at risk for many toxins in my home - I treat those risks appropriately. But I can't get the Hg out of the air, and fish and food crops that my grandkids eat. Of course I hang my clothes out and I have a solar oven that I love.

[fcharrua]

So you buy our electricity, good for you. I doubt you have to worry about the mercury in the air, unless you live near a coal burning plant. As for fish, avoid predator fish like tuna and shark, and you should be safe. Now, I think these numbers should explain my point, I have a few hydro bills with me: Jan / Feb I used 4100 kwh, Apr / May I used 1160 kwh. Assuming i keep 3 light bulbs on 24 hours per day for 2 months, that uses 173kwh. Take away the 8 hours we spend sleeping, and that's 120kwh.

[47f0]

Which, assuming 60w bulbs means that's 120kw that should have been 26kw hours. And the whole North American grid buys power back and forth as demand merits. Reducing power anywhere on the grid helps - and keep in mind power generation doesn't just create Hg, there's a whole bunch of toxins. I agree totally on reducing your major appliances, which is why I solar cook and hang dry clothing. Think solar cooking isn't for Quebec? Check this guy v=47rpRAA86eo

[fcharrua]

I use 40 watt bulbs.

[vmelkon]

It's true. Light bulbs are not significant for people who live in Canada, specially during the winter months. We have no choice but turn up the heating. By turning on computers, TVs and incandescent bulbs, we heat up our homes a little. I am in Quebec also.

[mrpainintheheinie]

i really like the way you think.

[DancingRaven]

Dan you are such a jewel. Mahalo for the best presentation on these bulbs......I really loved the comment about the phone number..your wife is a lucky woman. Thank you for helping the Mother Earth! Dancing Raven

[Kiwibirdman1701]

You rock! You hit the nail on the head! I love these bulbs and you're right, they never do seem to burn out.

[autismtookmickie]

Autism has been linked to Mercury containing vaccines and I don't see the CDC and the FDA doing anything but trying to cover it up. Mercury the second most neuro-toxic metal on earth is allowed in childhood vaccines along with lead, alumminum, etc. Mercury becomes more toxic when in contact with other heavy metals.

If you eat ingest it your stomach is able to filter out toxins.

Why is it dangerous to eat it or breath it, but it's okay to inject it into out baby's bodies.

[DrBrazil1]

A typical CFL contains 4 miligrams of mercury, yes they do need to be disposed properly. However, a coal fire power plant emits 10 mg of mercury to produce the electricity to run an incandescent bulb over its lifetime; the number is only 2.4 mg for a CFL. Overall, CFLs actually can keep mercury out of the environment.

[vmelkon]

"However, a coal fire power plant emits 10 mg of mercury to produce the electricity to run an incandescent bulb"

Where is mercury mined? How much of it is spilled into the environment? How much escapes as vapor? Most of the worlds mercury comes from China. The US, Chile and other countries are minor producers.

[seniorsungod]

Mercury is naturally occurring in coal and is vaporized when it is burned. And yes, because China has huge coal deposits (like us) and inefficient coal fired power plants, it is heavily polluting the air with mercury. We're not talking about intentionally mined mercury.

[vmelkon]

You are talking about the small amounts of mercury impurities in coal. I'm talking about the mercury in CFL. It has to be mined of course. The process of mining pollutes the environment but this fact is conveniently not mentioned by anyone except me.

[47f0]

Fifty tons a year is not a small amount. The mercury released by power plants goes into the air you breathe, the water you drink, and the fish and plant crops you eat - and mercury toxicity accumulates upward in the food chain. Which coal lobbyist firm do you work for anyway?

[stevenabb]

@47f0 - I challenge your assumptions: Overall, I would rather have mercury released into the air from a power plants than my children's bedrooms. Besides, a lot of coal powered plants have been replaced with green alternatives or natural gas so the ( power plant = mercury ) argument is not so valid. With the low quality of CFB's being created in China, how many CFB's are being thrown away how often vs. power plant mercury?

[47f0]

@stevenabb - assume, worst case, you break a case of CFLs in your kid's bedroom. You have the option of moving into another trailer. Try moving your kids out of the environment. You're saying, "Mercury is fine as long as I don't know about it." The info on environmental Hg is straight from the DOE, and includes the current mix of power plants, which aren't as clean as you think. And Hg isn't the only pollution they produce, BTW. As to the allegedly crap Chinese CFLs, I have yet to replace any.

[my83merc]

there has recently been worry about the ammount of Hg in CFL's in the event of breakage and how dangerous exposure to a broken bulb can be. Ofcourse this all arose when a customer service rep from one of the CFL manufacturers told a customer that because a bulb had broken in their home they needed to have the situation professionally assesed. The result was a $2000 bill at the expense of the customer.