Fluorescent Light Bulbs Can Become 'Toxic Time Bombs'

Fox News ^ | July 9, 2007 | Andrea Thompson

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

Highly efficient fluorescent light bulbs are widely touted as environmentally friendly, but they have created a recycling headache for the Environmental Protection Agency and local governments.

More often than not, their toxic ingredients simply end up in landfills, where the chemicals can leach into soil and water and poison fish and other wildlife.

The bulbs contain mercury and should not be tossed in the trash as are regular light bulbs.

"They're very efficient, but once they're used up, they become a ticking toxic time bomb," said Leonard Robinson, chief deputy director of the California Department of Toxic Substances Control. "They need to be captured and recycled."

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

The environmental left in California want to make these things mandatory everywhere. I've read there is a chemical coating which burns off while the light is on. Personally, I get headaches when I'm around these things for too long. The artificial light hurts my eyes.

[Wiseghy]

They contain mercury. Hard to imagine a more toxic substance. You are supposed to clear the room if you ever break one.

Guess that means shooting the old ones with my BB gun is now out of the question?

[clamper1797]

Ah yes .... Fluorescent Light Bulbs .... from the same people (idiots) who gave us MTBE

[Brilliant]

I guess I better stop eating fluorescent light bulbs.

[mo]

“The environmental left in California want to make these things mandatory everywhere....”

Yeah...then they’ll mandate a disposal law they administer!!

[Jaysun]

I've been wondering how the left is going to reconcile their crackpot claims about the dangers of mercury and their claims about the saving grace of fluorescent light bulbs.

We put them in our house and didn't notice a difference on the electric bill. And the light they give off isn't as bright or nice.

[Leftism is Mentally Deranged]

I love it when one leftist dogma bites another leftist dogma.

[gov_bean_ counter]

The Law of Unintended Consequences.

[Jaysun]

I guess I better stop eating fluorescent light bulbs.

You can keep eating them as long as you don't also eat fish.

[6ppc]

I love it when one leftist dogma bites another leftist dogma.

Breaking! Dogma Bites Man!

[dennisw]

The environmental left in California want to make these things mandatory everywhere. I've read there is a chemical coating which burns off while the light is on. Personally, I get headaches when I'm around these things for too long. The artificial light hurts my eyes.

I use incandescent. I don't like compact fluorescent light either. But I do use real 40" fluorescent lights in kitchen and garage

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

lol, I think so :-)

[Fishtalk]

Well I can’t be the only one with fluourescent lightbulbs in my house that have “exploded”.

I’m talking those long old-fashioned things that heaven forbid you should drop on the floor and that the trash people won’t pick up. Those curly things are nothing more than these long tubes all curled up real small like, right?

Didn’t we all know never to drop those things, that they would explode and emit this gas?

This is going to be a HUGE problem once a bunch of those bulbs get old because for now, the vast majority of them are new and giving folks across the fruited plains headaches and poor eyesight.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

LOL

[The_Repugnant_Conservative]

Which has more Mercury?

The florescent bulb?

The smokestack emissions from the coal fired power plant producing the extra electricity to run an incandescent bulb?

(Not to mention all the radioactive and other emssions from Coal Fired power plants.)

[Lucky9teen]

“The environmental left in California want to make these things mandatory everywhere....”

Yeah...then they’ll mandate a disposal law they administer!!

And then give you no way or place to dispose of them...

[Jaysun]

The EPA says that coal-fired power plants in the U.S. only account for about 1 percent of the total global mercury emissions. So U.S. power plants don’t seem to be a worthwhile starting point if we’re worried about reducing mercury emissions.

[goldstategop]

Liberals don't solve problems. They just create new ones.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[cripplecreek]

I like them simply because I don’t have to change them very often.

[cripplecreek]

It’s a dogma eat dogma world.