Those new coiled energy-efficient lightbulbs? - Yea, they contain mercury.

amynicole21 wrote: Full story here

This part is most important, but you should read the whole article:

“It was just a wiggly bulb that I reached up to change,” Bridges said. “When the bulb hit the floor, it shattered.”

When Bridges began calling around to local government agencies to find out what to do, “I was shocked to see how uninformed literally everyone I spoke to was,” she said. “Even our own poison control operator didn’t know what to tell me.”

The state eventually referred her to a private cleanup firm, which quoted a $2,000 estimate to contain the mercury. After Bridges complained publicly about her predicament, state officials changed their recommendation: Simply throw it in the trash, they said.

Break a bulb? Five steps for cleanup
That was the wrong answer, according to the EPA. It offers a detailed, 11-step procedure you should follow: Air out the room for a quarter of an hour. Wear gloves. Double-bag the refuse. Use duct tape to lift the residue from a carpet. Don’t use a vacuum cleaner, as that will only spread the problem. The next time you vacuum the area, immediately dispose of the vacuum bag.

In general, however, the EPA endorses the use of fluorescent bulbs, citing their energy savings. Silbergeld said that could send mixed signals to confused consumers.

“It’s kind of ironic that on the one hand, the agency is saying, ‘Don’t worry, it’s a very small amount of mercury.’ Then they have a whole page of [instructions] how to handle the situation if you break one,” she said.

The disposal problem doesn’t end there. Ideally, broken bulbs and their remains should be recycled at a facility approved to handle fluorescent lamps, but such facilities are not common.

California is one of only seven states — Minnesota, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin are the others — that ban disposing of fluorescent bulbs as general waste. And yet, qualified recycling facilities are limited to about one per county. In other states, collection of CFLs is conducted only at certain times of the year — twice annually in the District of Columbia, for example, and only once a year in most of Georgia.

In fact, qualified places to recycle CFLs are so few that the largest recycler of of fluorescent bulbs in America is Ikea, the furniture chain.

MommyToAshley replied: I had read about a similar incident when the bulbs first came out, but the clean up cost was a lot more. We never switched to these bulbs for that very reason.

bawoodsmall replied: wonderful. We use those

kit_kats_mom replied: http://www.snopes.com/medical/toxins/cfl.asp

coasterqueen replied: I hadn't seen this but I know my husband, being an electrical engineer, deals with lighting and therefore deals/knows a lot about the bulbs used in them. This is what he said to me when I sent him the article (sorry honey, if you see this out here hope you don't mind me posting it ).

"No I hadn't seen the article, but I did know the bulbs contain trace amounts of mercury.

My understanding is this there have been fluorescent bulbs out there for a long time in commercial buildings with much higher amounts of mercury. The new bulbs have far lower amounts in them and therefore I believe we are putting less mercury into the environment now even with the release of fluorescent bulbs to the residential market than what we were 10 years ago.

Do you remember the old mercury thermometers and thermostats for houses? Those things had like 18 million times more mercury in them than fluorescent bulbs do. Think about how many of those are now in landfills with the advent of digital thermometers and thermostats. I would say this is an environmental wacko article and the hazards are not as great as what they make it out to be, but that is just me.

In any case if they get broken it is a good idea to handle with care and I guess it would be nice if there were a recycling program available to the public. Unfortunately, there isn't that I know of and the only option is to throw it in the trash.

I plan to keep using them. Probably safer for me than all the microwaves beaming into my brain from all the new wireless technologies."

My Dh was the one adament on going with them because he always said the pros were better - less electricity used, etc. So I'll go with the flow.

amynicole21 replied: Yea, my concern is more for when they break than the amount that gets into the environment through waste disposal. Honestly, I didn't know they needed so much care. Also, flourescent bulbs in buildings aren't as likely to shatter when my 5yo decides it's a great idea to play light-saber star wars games in the kitchen under the chandelier with the long-handled swiffer broom

coasterqueen replied:
Sorry I had to laugh at that. We've never had one break so I never thought about it, really, but I guess I should.

~Roo'sMama~ replied: We have some, but I'm not too worried about the amount of mercury in them if one of them broke. What's a bigger issue to me is the inconvenience of getting rid of them properly. We just had one burn out (which is another thing... those things are supposed to last a long time and we'd had it for less than a year. ) and I couldn't find anything online on how exactly to recycle it, so I finally called the city and they told me to hang on to it and bring it to the annual toxic waste dump day, which isn't until May or June. So I have one lone light bulb in a plastic bag hanging in my mud room waiting for me to hopefully remember to bring it on the one day of the year that you can dump it.

MoonMama replied: We tried a few of them and honestly we had 3-4 burn out in know time (and no they were not on all the time). But this is another reason not to use them I guess.

bawoodsmall replied:
Mine also. I have seen a difference in our bill since switching. I am not sure yet what we will do. I do know I have had it with worrying about everything!!! My grandkids are going to be in a bubble. By then everything will be bad.

jem0622 replied: How utterly lovely. Thanks for the info, Amy.

redchief replied: Thanks for sharing.