Used light bulbs and thinking green don’t mix
With Earth Day recently behind us, there’s been quite a lot of media attention devoted lately to replacing our energy-inefficient incandescent light bulbs with the much-more efficient compact fluorescent bulbs.
How many grassroots inquiries and local governments
does it take to recycle a light bulb?
According to industry stats, more than 90% of the energy produced by incandescent lamps is heat, not light, and this makes them far less efficient than compact fluorescent bulbs. In addition, fluorescents typically last 10 times longer. Even though fluorescent bulbs contain mercury, incandescent bulbs are responsibile for releasing comparatively more mercury into the environment. And one gram of mercury is enough to contaminate a 20-acre lake.
Certainly the price point is coming down on these compact fluorescents enough that more people are buying them, and they’re beginning to buy them in droves. I know I am. And so I found myself asking the question, How, then, will this greater supply of used incandescents impact the environment?
Apparently there’s no easy answer. I found the following statement on clutterfreeservices.com:
Incandescent light bulbs contain lead at levels that exceed hazardous waste limits and must be taken to a toxic disposal facility.
Yeesh! And I’ve merely been throwing them away for years, like everybody else. But wait! There’s more:
Fluorescent light bulbs contain a small amount of mercury and California law prohibits putting them in the trash. Many hardware stores will accept them for recycling. Here’s a complete list of places in San Francisco.
Fortunately a number of localities have adopted residential recycling programs for fluorescent bulbs. But are you, like me, unaware of the environmental impact of our discarding of incandescents? Apparently a lot of us who believe we’re acting green are about to dump unknown mass quantities of incandescent light bulbs onto our landfills. We either need viable recycling programs that separate the lead from the glass and metal – as I presume is similarly done for the mercury in fluorescents – or we need, each of us, to be aware of the locations of our hazardous waste disposal facilities.
And then actively make use of them, like I’m now going to do. (Sigh. One more trip in the car.)
Here’s a list of hazardous waste disposal facilities near my home in the south San Francisco Bay Area. If you look online for hazardous waste disposal facilities in your area and don’t find one, call your congressperson and ask why you can’t recycle your incandescent light bulbs. Tell ‘em The Winehiker said to raise Hell!
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San Francisco County (415) 554-4333
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Alameda County (800) 606-6606
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Marin County (415) 485-6806
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San Mateo County (650) 363-4607
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Sonoma County (877) 747-1870
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Santa Clara County (408) 299-7300
Is anybody else thinking about this stuff? Anybody??
Related posts:
April 26th, 2007 11:32
See this link for recycling fluorescent bulbs:
http://www.buylighting.com/RECYCLEPAK-5-Gallon-Mixed-Lamps-Recycling-Kit-p/supply-068.htm
April 26th, 2007 12:27
Dicky, that’s nice, but with many local recycling centers accepting compact fluorescents for recycling, I don’t think paying eighty bucks for a bucket and storing that bucket around the house until it’s full is helpful for most people. In effect, your site does not offer a cost-effective – or better yet, curbside – solution.
The question remains: what can we do to foster the recycling of lead-containing incandescent bulbs?
February 25th, 2009 22:02
[...] Used light bulbs and thinking green don’t mix How many grassroots inquiries and local governments does it take to recycle an incandescent light bulb? (tags: light bulb incandescent recycle recycling resources mercury lead compact fluorescent) [...]
March 13th, 2009 07:20
[...] I wrote recently about the inefficiency of incandescent light bulbs and the lack of municipal programs for recycling their lead content. But the fact remains that we need to replace these archaic energy-wasting bulbs with the much-more-efficient compact fluorescent (CFL) bulbs. In a world facing almost daily new evidence of global warming and its consequences, there is a need for a quick decisive victory in the effort to cut carbon emissions and stabilize our climate. If we can engineer a rapid phase-out of inefficient incandescents, we can almost ensure just such a victory, as well as generate momentum for even greater advances in climate stabilization. [...]