What to do with Broken Compact Fluorescent Globe
General Technical Stuff May 15th, 2010Dear Daniel
I have just accidentally dropped and broken a compact fluorescent lamp while installing it
My friend tells me that I am going to die of some terrible mercury driven disease and that I should sell the house
Can you please en”lighten” me (LOL)
Many thanks
Jill
May 15th, 2010 at 12:41 pm
Hi Jill
Thanks for your great question
Yes I agree there has been a lot of scare tactics since the governments controversial ban of the incandescent globe recently. This is a dammed if we do and dammed if dont situation. The Compact Fluorescent Light (CFL) globe will save a lot of electricity and green house pollution but the other side of the coin is that that contain tiny small amounts of mercury. These are in the new compact fluorescent globes but have also been in the long straight tubes (in much higher amounts) that we have been using for the past 40 years
The government has produced some advice regarding what to do when you have a smashed Fluorescent globe but also provides some propaganda on the up and down sides of the CFL debate. Apparently there is only enough mercury to fit on the tip of your ball point pen but the energy saving in 2 years will be the equivalent of taking 500,000 cars off the road or they could shut a power station??
In any case please have a read and follow the advice
http://www.environment.gov.au/sustainability/energyefficiency/lighting/publications/fs.html#how
Clean it up immediately (see link)
Ventilate the area (see link)
Stick it into yet another glass container so the garbage man can break it and contaminate himself
etc etc
But the next valid point is what to do with the fluorescent lamp after they have died at end of life? At present there arent too many local councils in Australia providing disposal service for these globes but that is great topic for another post I am sure
Thanks for your question
Kind regards
Daniel