Posted on 03/08/2011 10:51:38 AM PST by CedarDave
LOS ALAMOS, N.M. (AP) - Los Alamos National Laboratory is increasing its use of a machine to crush fluorescent bulbs.
The machine known as the Bulb Eater attaches to the top of a 55-gallon drum and works like a large food processor.
Fluorescent bulbs contain small amounts of mercury vapor. That means they must be labeled, boxed and disposed of as a type of hazardous waste.
(Excerpt) Read more at krqe.com ...
Space-saving bulb crusher used Labwide
Note that the device is engineered to recover the mercury vapor and transform it into non-hazardous mercuric sulfide. Now all this fancy equipment would not be necessary if incandescent bulbs were used.
Fluorescents have their place in businesses, office buildings, etc. and maybe this device can be used for disposal of these bulbs. But for individual homeowners, treating a broken bulb as a haz-mat incident or disposing of it as hazardous waste is a burdensome task made necessary by the banning of a simple light bulb design that has been serving mankind for over 130 years. There is Republican-proposed federal legislation to overturn the ban on incandescent bulbs (see http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2685547/posts)
And totally unneccessary because the EPA regulates industry, not a homeowner (...yet!). Just toss those suckers in the weekly trash.
Wasn’t there something the other day about the OTHER leftist boondoggle, low flow toilets, causing environmental problems?
Yes, low-flow toilets on the San Francisco peninsula were causing sludge backup which in turn is causing an odor problem. The solution (and their decision) is to bleach the lines to kill the odors which will cost much more than the water saved. The whole story didn’t make a lot of sense to me because they then talked about treating drinking water with the bleach also. Bottom line — beware of unintended consequences.
Hmmmmm, I need one of those. When my garage flourescents burn out, I stand them up on end, and with my safety glasses on, hit them with a broom stick from maybe four feet away.
The economics of the CFLs is bogus because not only is there a costly disposal problem, but my experience is they do not last nearly as long as advertised. They are everywhere yet there is no user friendly way to properly dispose of them, therefore they are going to the landfills with the rest of the household trash.
Another boondoggle brought about by lobbyist promoting foreign interests with pockets full of cash for campaigns.
Get a 4 1/2 foot length piece of lightweight PVC that is large enough to insert them into, set the end into a plastic and paper bag. Bend the PVC until the bulb breaks. Dump them into an old plastic container and into the trash.
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