[SustainableTompkins] broken CFL/mercury clean up

[Thomas Shelley]

At 10:51 AM 6/30/2008 -0400, you wrote:
>All this back and forth about CFLs has reawakened a question I have had for
>years. What about non-compact fluorescent tubes? You know, the straight
>ones, 2 or 4 feet long, and the circline bulbs. Don't they contain mercury
>too? They break pretty easily too, if disposed of in the trash. I have been
>saving them for years, pending resolution of the question.

Dear Joel and Friends--Yes!  The standard tubular bulbs have even more 
mercury--up to 15 mg.  This is compared to 3.5 mg. for an "older" CFL or 
1/10 of that amount for a newer, reduced mercury version.

Per the suggestion of another subscriber, take all of your fluorescent 
bulbs to the Tompkins Solid Waste Management Division facility on 
Commercial Ave. for disposal.  Never intentionally break a fluorescent bulb 
to dispose of it in the trash.

Another thought is that most of our mercury exposure comes from coal-fired 
power plants.  In theory at least, if we put pressure on out energy 
infrastructure providers to use "Green" methods of generating electricity 
we will be greatly reducing our dependance on coal-fired 
plants.  Eventually we would reduce our mercury emissions in this 
way.  However, Big Coal is a very powerful force in the energy market and 
whether it is realistic to reduce the emissions from coal-fired plants by 
their elimination from the energy market is very dubious.  The best thing 
to do with coal is to leave it in the ground, but this is unlikely to 
happen in our lifetimes.  My $.02.   Tom

******************************************
Tom Shelley
118 E. Court St.
Ithaca, NY 14850
607 342-0864
tjs1 at cornell.edu

Compost Educator and General Sustainability Geek