Yesterday afternoon, my naughty 16-month-old golden retriever was making the telltale sound of destruction upstairs. It took me a moment to register the evidence I found in his grinning mouth: the bloody stump of a CFL light bulb! And I had nearly stepped barefoot onto the glass shards and powder strewn across the floor. Oh dear.
My first thought was to take care of my dog, naturally, and after cleaning the glass from his mouth and face I rushed him to our nearby vet in a panic. Luckily, there were no serious lacerations in his mouth, and I’ve got my fingers crossed that he didn’t swallow anything. Phew for now. He'll eat something else tomorrow.
My relief was followed by the realization that I had no clue how to clean up the mess. Since CFL bulbs contain mercury, it occurred to me that I’d need to use some caution, so I quickly found some tips from the EPA and Energy Star (as well as a great post on Unplggd), which I’ve included below.
By the way, it’s natural to freak out a little when anything containing mercury breaks in your house — I did! — but from what I’ve read, it’s a very miniscule amount and if you follow these fairly easy steps, you and your family — crazy puppies included — should be perfectly safe.
Before cleanup
• Have people and animals leave the room.
• Air things out for 15 minutes by opening a window or door.
• Shut off the central forced air heating/air-conditioning system, if you have one.
During cleanup
• Wear gloves, and use stiff cardboard or paper to scoop up the glass shards and visible powder.
• Place cleanup materials in a sealable container like a plastic bag or glass jar with lid.
• Use stick tape to pick up any remaining fragments or powder.
• You can vacuum the carpet, but Energy Star advises not to vacuum the hard floors.
• For hard floors, use damp paper towels and wipe the area clean; dispose of them in the sealed plastic bag.
After cleanup
• Place all debris and cleanup supplies outdoors in a trash container or protected area until materials can be disposed of properly. (“Disposed of properly” varies from place to place; a quick online search should yield that info.)
• Avoid leaving any bulb fragments or cleanup supplies indoors.
• If practical, continue to air out the room where the bulb was broken and leave the heating/air conditioning system shut off for several hours.
Image: via Unplggd
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It's best to treat the bulbs like a toxic substance and recycle them at the appropriate site. IKEA has a place to recycle them and so do some Home Depot. They should NEVER be thrown in the trash.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7431198
@NoxSophia: That is presuming they are unbroken, though, right? What I've read is that in many places you can dispose of broken bulbs in the trash if you place them in sealed plastic bags or sealed glass jars. Or can you bring broken bulbs to Ikea and Home Depot? You still have to dispose of the cleanup materials properly, though.
This is so overboard it's silly.
I remember as a kid in the early 1970's in public school playing with little beads of Quicksilver (Mercury) in our hands a couple of times during Science hour...
...and people have been cleaning up broken thermometers and barometers (which contain mercury) for decades.
Never head of anyone dying from doing so either.
You know, when I was a kid we used to use the mercury from broken thermometers to coat dimes. We rubbed the mercury onto the coin with our bare fingers, and nobody ever died. Nobody ever got sick. (We were defacing currency, but that's a different thread!)
I'm not saying mercury is safe, or that allowing it to accumulate in the environment is ok. BUT, I think it's ridiculous to panic over it. If you break ANY kind of thin glass, the cleanup is about the same -- you want to avoid even tiny splinters or shards so you try to get all of them cleaned up thoroughly.
(I got a splinter of glaze from a broken ceramic vase in my foot that hurt like you would not believe -- and when my partner got it out with a sewing needle and tweezers and a magnifying glass, we could barely even see it.)
You dispose of glass fragments in a way that they won't hurt other people or creatures, including sanitation workers. But even bulbs with mercury, if broken once in a blue moon, don't need to be treated as toxis waste, and the only reason I can see for airing out the space is the dust from the bulb. If you clean that up too, there is nothign to worry about.
Regular burned out CFLs should be properly disposed of in the hazardout waste stream, but only because en masse they could leach a measurable amount of mercury into the ground and groundwater.
I nearly freaked out the first time I broke one of these. I wrote to the EPA and someone actually replied to me. It turns out the reason they give such strict guidelines is because they don't know the long term effects of breakage BUT there is less mercury in the average CFL than there is in a can of tuna!
I don't eat canned tuna more than a couple of times a year, and I'm not going to freak out about cleaning up these bulbs either. Dispose of it properly, yes.
Well, your dog isn't the only one to find a CFL and appropriate chew toy... but mine was in it for the cardboard box around it (He also likes DVD cases, but spares the DVDs. It's weird).
I agree with bepsf: it's not something to panic about. I bit through a mercury thermometer when I was a kid, and it wasn't a big deal then. My biggest worry is typically the glass, since the mercury is such a small quantity.
Apparently, mercury is more harmful to inhale than to touch or even eat. Anyway, having actually done this cleanup, I didn't really find it to be overboard. For the extra three minutes it took me to use precaution, I feel better knowing I minimized risk. Also, to say that something is totally safe because you used to play with it as a child? People used to think asbestos and lead paint were pretty safe, too. Just sayin' ...
I'm just thrilled to see a how to on this that doesn't include the alarmists screaming that they have to call a Hazmat Team!
"People used to think asbestos and lead paint were pretty safe, too."
Asbestos and lead are right up there with the ridiculous factor:
It's long term exposure to breathing in airborne Asbestos fibers which causes that lung cancer - Having it in your floor tiles isn't a probem...
...and having lead paint on the walls isn't going to hurt you either - but your baby eating it when it peels off the window sill won't do the child any good.
NEVER VACUUM Broken CFL !!
Eek, under no circumstances should you advise the use of a vacuum!! The vacuum warms the mercury and puts it in the air so you and the family can breathe it in. No, it won't kill you, but it may cause effects on your nervous system, especially in children.
ps. I work in environmental health
If someone is so afraid of what MIGHT happen with a CFL, they probably shouldn't buy them. We don't buy them anymore because not one of them has lasted anywhere near as long as advertised, so we're losing money like crazy on them. I hope LED bulbs are better.
Mercury Oxide is what is harmful, especially if it's inhaled. Liquid mercury doesn't oxidize very easily, hence people that eat tuna or played with it as kids aren't dead/harmed. When CFLs break, they release mercury vapor, which is more easily oxidized.
You've got be kidding me. The disposal AND the hype...all ridiculous IMO. I'm sticking with my old-school regular light bulbs until someone peels them from my cold dead hands.
I would like to see a realistic study of the cost-benefit ratio of CFLs over incandescent bulbs (as I suspect there is none). As far as the mercury is concerned, the mercury in a CFL, or even a commercial florescent tube, is about the same amount as the ball in a ballpoint pen. Just like you wouldn't stick your hand into a toilet with poo, you should avoid mercury because of the /potential/ for negative effects. If you choose to live a carefree life, then by all means, play with mercury, eat at MacDoh's, and ride a motorcycle without a helmet. This is a lifestyle question at this point, not a right-and-wrong debate.
CFLs do save energy, but they also contain small amounts of mercury. As this article states, it is important for consumers to realize that CFLs and fluorescent bulbs contain mercury and require special handling. The mercury vapor can be detrimental to handlers' health—from those involved with handling new bulbs to people involved with storing, packaging and shipping used lamps. Mercury vapor, which can be absorbed through the skin or inhaled, can cause neurological damage, and when it gets into water, it can enter the food chain through fish. Read more about the dangers of mercury exposure here: http://vaporlok.blogspot.com/2010/05/preventing-health-and-safety-hazards.html.
If a bulb is broken or burns out, it should be properly cleaned up and recycled—it should not be disposed of in landfills. To reduce the risk for mercury vapor exposure, CFLs and fluorescent lamps should be safely handled, stored and transported to recycling facilities in a package that is proven to effectively contain hazardous mercury vapor. Find out more about how to minimize environmental risks and safely package CFLs here: http://vaporlok.blogspot.com/2010/05/layers-of-protection-packaging-used.html
If a bulb breaks, consumers can learn more about clean-up procedures here: http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup-detailed.html