I don't recall ever having heard anyone suggest that CFL bulbs should 
be treated as hazardous or disposed of in ways appropriate for toxic 
materials.

The latest standards for CFLs require not more than 5 mg of Mercury 
content. How much current ones (typically of Indian and Chinese 
origin) contain is unknown to me.

I'm also unaware of how significant 5 mg of Mercury is liable to be, 
how much is released by a bulb shattering when cold, how much when hot 
etc. When hot I'd imagine there'd be a substantial release.

The acceptable levels for Mercury are minute - a broken bulb can lead 
to levels 10 time higher than "safe" maximums, maybe much more if the 
bulb was operating when broken. Whether this matters actually matters 
a whit I do not know. But, it may be time to find out.

Matthew McMahon started this with

"http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/story.html?id=aa7796aa-e4a5-4c06-be84-b62dee548fda"

And Gargoyle says, amongst much more

http://www.nema.org/lamprecycle/epafactsheet-cfl.pdf

http://www.io.com/~dstroup/mercury.html

http://www.michigan.gov/deq/0,1607,7-135-3585_30068_30172-90210--,00.html

http://oee.nrcan.gc.ca/energystar/english/consumers/questions-answers.cfm

http://www.lighting.philips.com/gl_en/news/press/sustainability/archive_2006/reduction_in_mercury.php?main=global&parent=4390&id=gl_en_news&lang=en

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7431198

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:CFL_bulb_mercury_use_environment.svg


FWIW, the latter ref says that a CFL contains about 40% of the mercury 
found in the emissions from a coal powered power plant used to power 
an equivalent output incandescent bulb. Add the CFL's own power plant 
emissions and it 'owns' about 50% of the mercury that an incandescent 
bulb does. One difference is that a CFL is in you house and landfill 
and may or may not break. An incandescent bulbs mercury is released at 
the coal powered power station and may or may not be scrubbed from the 
exhaust. YMWV.

Overall it's probably a standard case of 'You can't win, you can't 
break even, you can't get out of the game' :-).



        Russell




-- 
http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive
View/change your membership options at
http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist