The CFL mercury nightmare [break a compact fluorescent, face $2000 in cleanup costs]

Financial Post (Canada) ^ | April 28, 2007 | Steven Milloy

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

In case you haven't read it yet, comment 12. The glass is supposed to NOT be vacuumed.

[Retired Chemist]

What a crock! Just another over reaction from a government agency.

[SledgeCS]

$2000 for a 4-5mg spill? I remember as a kid playing with the mercury in my dad’s garage. It was in a 4” bottle that had to weight 4-8oz, well that much before us kids found it. I am pretty sure I could move a toolbox or 2 in that garage and still find those little grey balls of mercury against the wall. If I tell my father about the cost there goes my inheritance.

[mad_as_he$$]

Break any except the newest fluorescent lamps and there is merc around.

[Cicero]

Moral of the story: Do NOT call in the DEP or the EPA. If you do, you will never get free of them again.

Probably when this lady goes to sell her house, she will be required to warn potential buyers that it has been contaminated with dangerous pollutants.

[Retired Chemist]

I don’t know how many mercury spills I’ve cleaned up in my career. There is a special vacuum available for cleaning up the stuff.

[Dr.Zoidberg]

Moral of the story: Do NOT call in the DEP or the EPA. If you do, you will never get free of them again.

There is never a situation so dire that involving bureaucrats won't make it exponentially worse.

[Retired Chemist]

Mercury Recovery Vacuum.

http://www.nikro.com/mec_rec_vacs.htm

[basil]

I was thinking the same thing. As kids, we always seemed to have a supply of mercury to play with. We would use it to shine up dimes and quarters, drip it around on a surface, and then play a game to bring all the litttle balls back together.

After all this exposure to mercury 50 or 60 years ago, I don't seem to be suffering any ill side effects.

[stockpirate]

So what it saves the planet from carbon eating jellyfish.

[mad_as_he$$]

Nice link thanks, I’ve been looking for a concise set of instructions. FWIW a you can vacuum IF you obtain a unit with a certified HEPA filter.

[mad_as_he$$]

I venture to guess that all you wrote looks ok to you? / jk

[basil]

Yeah—it does, actually.

[armymarinemom]

I don’t know how many mercury spills I’ve cleaned up in my career

What are those heavy sponges from that come in mercury clean up kits?

[basil]

LOL! I missed your JK the first go ‘round. I thought you might be trying to diagram my sentences or something.

[Sherman Logan]

Actually, this isn’t too far off my own line of work.

Not every HEPA-filtered vac is appropriate, only ones certified for this particular use. They tend to be very expensive. She’d prolly be better off hiring the company for $2k.

[theBuckwheat]

Deliberately dropping a CFL on the floor in a public building is an act of such wide ranging consequences that it could be considered an act of terrorism.

[Publius6961]

According to an April 12 article in The Ellsworth American, Bridges had the misfortune of breaking a CFL during installation in her daughter's bedroom: It dropped and shattered on the carpeted floor.

Light bulbs don't kill people.
Neurotic klutzes kill people.

Just saying.

[ReignOfError]

I had some old (30+years) pesticides in my basement, including some that have been banned since (no DDT). When a shelf collapsed and a bottle broke, filling the house with fumes, I called poison control, who told me to call 911.

When the firefighters arrived, they used a kitty-litter-type substance to absorb the spill, and carried the broken and intact bottles out to the back yeard. They said there was nothing hazardous to humans, and I should just open the doors and windows and vent the house with as many fans as I could lay hands on. I should jut step outside if I felt light-headed.

When I asked what I should do about clean-up, the lady in charge said “Technically, I’m supposed to tell you to call a hazmat team. They’ll come in in containment suits and it’ll cost about a thousand bucks.”

Then she leaned in and said, quietly, “but the litter will absorb into the back yard, and that box looks a lot like household waste. You didn’t hear that from me.”

[joshhiggins]

My father (now deceased) used to tell how when he was a kid he collected about 50 lbs of mercury from old thermostats and switches and took it to the fourth floor of his school and poured it down the stairs. He said little silver balls of mercury rolled down the hallways, under classroom doors, and could be found rolling around the school for years.