Tag Archives: mercury

Mercury recycling could save lives | Sci-Tech | DW.DE | 16.05.2012

May 17, 2012   nlrgreen   No comments

Mercury is a toxic heavy metal still used in masses of everyday products. Disposing of it, experts say, requires advanced technology – and it could save children’s lives in develeoping countries.

Young people in many emerging countries continue to risk their health – and lives – dismantling electrical and electronic devices that contain mercury.

Indiais a prime example, according to Jochen Flasbarth, president of Germany’s Federal Environment Agency, who recently travelled to India and observed local methods of recycling electronic components.

“There you see mostly children in homes and apartments dismantling computers and other electronic devices, as well as electrical lamps, by hand – without any knowledge of the health hazards,” he said. “It’s a shocking sight.”

EU mercury export ban

To protect people against such hazards, the EU imposed an export ban on mercury in March 2011. Within the EU, the toxic substance now has to be disposed of in an environmentally-friendly way.

Germany’s largest recycling company, DELA in Essen, specializes in separating mercury from products and disposing of it safely.

Trucks regularly arrive at the recycler full of used florescent tubes. Fork-lift operators remove pallets full of the tubes and dump them into large hoppers. A powerful ventilation system keeps the air free of poisonous mercury fumes.

The tubes are then shredded and transported to a silo, where two tons of newly shredded glass are added every hour, according to DELA‘s managing director, Christian Bonmann.

From there, the crushed lamp glass is pushed through pipes to a broken-glass washer.

“We free the shredded lamps of the fluorescent powder by rinsing the pieces with clean water until they are pollution-free,” Bonmann said. “The metal and glass are separated up front by a sieve. We then ship the metal and glass back to the manufacturers.”

In addition to the glass and metal, a white sludge remains. It is rich in illuminates, which contain precious metals, such as yttrium and europium.

But the sludge also contains mercury.

So, in a next step – to separate the mercury from the illuminates – the sludge is poured into a vacuum dryer, which functions much like a clothes dryer.

Once the sludge is dry, it’s put into a vacuum and heated to 370 degrees Celsius to vaporize the mercury. Like a schnapps distillery, the mercury vapour enters a condenser and drips out, producing pure mercury.

Rotary kiln

The process also produces pollution-free illuminates, which light-bulb manufacturers can in turn use.

DELA also operates a revolving cylindrical furnace, which is three meters high and about twice as long. It can process all sorts of mercury-contaminated materials, particularly filters from coal-fired power plants and waster incinerators.

READ MORE VIA  Mercury recycling could save lives | Sci-Tech | DW.DE | 16.05.2012.

Read More

Oregon Lawmakers Target Mercury in Light Bulbs | Heartlander Magazine

March 06, 2012   nlrgreen   No comments

CHERYL K. CHUMLEY

The Oregon Senate has passed a bill limiting the amount of mercury allowed in compact fluorescent light bulbs that can be sold or distributed in the state. The Senate passed the bill on Feb. 15 by a vote of 21-8, with one member not voting.

Agreement on Common Bulbs

“It came about through negotiations with the industry for some of the more common consumer bulbs,” said Scott Klag, a senior planner for Metro, an elected regional government body for the Portland area.

The bill, SB 1512, creates very specific standards for compact fluorescent light bulbs, otherwise known as CFLs. Mercury levels cannot exceed 4 milligrams for “screw-based compact fluorescent lamps less than 25 watts,” and 5 milligrams for “compact fluorescent lamps equal to or more than 25 watts and less than 40 watts.”

Consumers will be most affected by “the compact fluorescent with the swirly top,” for which “the limit would be 4 milligrams per lamp,” Abby Boudouris, a solid waste policy analyst with the state’s Department of Environmental Quality, told Environment & Climate News.

Click Below for more

via Oregon Lawmakers Target Mercury in Light Bulbs | Heartlander Magazine.

Read More

Canada Delays Phase Out of Incandescent Light Bulbs for 2 Years | AltEnergyMag Press Release

February 24, 2012   nlrgreen   No comments

All developed markets worldwide are committed to implementing energy efficiency standards for light bulbs, and this includes the US, the EU, Australia and Canada. The energy efficiency standard for light bulbs was introduced in 2007 with the stated aim of improving incandescent bulbs or replacing them with more efficient technologies, notably with compact fluorescent and LED bulbs. The underlying aim of energy saving is to reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emissions by the enforcement of low energy requirements.

Numerous concerns have been voiced with regard to energy-saving compact fluorescent lamps (CFL), mainly due to their potential risks to health, their actual performance and issues involved in their disposal due to their mercury content. Research conducted by the Canadian government indicated that CFLs pose no health risks from ultraviolet radiation or electromagnetic emission, but noted that more time is needed to communicate these facts to consumers effectively.

Reasons given for delaying the implementation in Canada by two years are that the amendment to the regulations will provide more time to communicate research findings to the public as well as more time to install CFL disposal programs. The main messages to the Canadian public are that no one technology will have to be used, alternatives will become available and the use of CFLs poses no health risks.

However, the delay will put Canada one or two years behind the US schedule for incandescent bulb phase-out as well as pushing any projected energy and cost savings further into the future.

via Canada Delays Phase Out of Incandescent Light Bulbs for 2 Years | AltEnergyMag Press Release.

Read More

International Lamp Recycling News-Busted lamps pose toxic risk

February 08, 2012   nlrgreen   No comments

WHEN busted fluorescent lamps are improperly disposed of, mercury — a potent neurotoxin — is released into the environment, endangering the health of both workers in garbages sites as well as the general public.

Environmental health groups aired this warning after conducting a “photo documentation” to find out how spent lamps are disposed of by “small quantity waste generators,” or entities that accumulate less than 100 busted lamps a year.

With the help of “Basura Patrollers” from the Diocese of Caloocan Ecology Ministry, EcoWaste Coalition, Global Alliance for IncineratorAlternatives and Mother Earth Foundation, photos from garbage bins and heaps were taken at random in January, 2012

The photos were taken in pavements and sidewalks in the cities of Caloocan, Las Piñas, Makati, Mandaluyong, Manila, Navotas, Parañaque, Pasay, San Juan  and Quezon.

Some of the photos can be viewed at http://ecowastecoalition.blogspot.com/

The investigation confirmed the unsafe practice of simply leaving or throwing mercury-containing lamp waste in the streets as if these were merely candy wrappers.

Busted lamps were dumped along with typical trash, or were left by the roadside, which were then picked up by garbage collectors, sometimes crushed in compactor trucks and then hauled to municipal waste landfills for final disposal.

This is very disturbing since these spent bulbs are no ordinary discards. Reckless disposal can lead to lamp breakage and the discharge of its mercury content in vapor form.

Citing information from a government-published “Primer on Mercury-Containing Lamp Waste Management,” the groups said that tubular fluorescent lamps can contain 3 to 50 mg. of mercury, while compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) can contain 1 to 25 mg. of mercury.

The  health impacts of mercury release and contamination, according to the primer, can include brain damage, memory loss, learning disabilities, behavioral problems, loss of sensation and vision, tremors, heart disease, kidney failure, liver injury and damage to the reproductive system.

Waste workers, particularly the paleros (garbage collectors) and the informal recyclers, are at risk of  direct exposure to mercury vapors from broken lamps.

Mercury vapor data at Pier 18 showed an average reading of over 117 micrograms per cubic meter (mcg/m3) with the highest reading at more than 502 mcg/m3.

The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration has set a “permissible exposure limit” for mercury vapor at  0.1 milligram per cubic meter (or 100 mcg/m3), warning that “a worker’s exposure to mercury vapor shall at no time exceed this ceiling level.”

To reduce and eliminate occupational and community mercury exposures, national and local authorities should enforce a system for the environmentally-sound management of busted lamps, including a practical system for safe collection, storage and recycling, the groups said.

The environmental groups said authorities should fast track the adoption of a product-take-back-system that will make manufacturers responsible for the management of their end-of-life fluorescent lamps.

The groups emphasized the need to educate the waste workers and the public about the hazards of mercury in the waste stream and the need for precaution to prevent toxic exposure through ingestion, inhalation and eye/skin contact.

Written by : Manny C. Calonzo
via Busted lamps pose toxic risk | Opinion.

Read More

Global News-India: Glowing mercury, growing panic

February 01, 2012   nlrgreen   No comments

Ashpreet Sethi, New Delhi, Jan 31,2012,DHNS:

Environmentalists say mercury in tube-lights and other fluorescent bulbs produced in India is exceeding the safe limit and there is no regulatory body to check the same.The mercury content in Compact Fluorescent Lamps CFLs has risen to six times more than the internationally recommended average content.Most of the CFLs are thrown into a water body and broken into pieces which releases the mercury in the air.

“This can lead to health hazards such as kidney failure and paralysis and harm the ecological balance as well. We need to push for standards as there is no regulated disposal mechanism for households and industries, which is polluting the air and surrounding water bodies. Moreover, India does not have a standardised labelling pattern,” said Rajeev Betne, senior programme co-ordinator with Toxics Link, Delhi.

Experts suggest that the government should act immediately as the growing CFL market has already replaced more than 80 per cent of the yellow bulbs or incandescent lamps (ICL) market in India.

Also, India imports almost 35 per cent of CFLs from China and Malaysia every year to meet the over growing domestic demand.

Research result

A study done by Toxic Links in September 2011, had highlighted that CFLs manufactured in India of about 22 miligram when the international standards suggest 1.5 miligram per bulb.

The study was conducted on a sample of 22 fluorescent bulbs from four different brands. A huge variation was observed in the content of mercury in the same range of bulbs within the same brand.

“This indicates that there is no control or limitation on the machine instilling mercury in these bulbs,” added Betne. 

Moreover, many of fluorescent bulbs do not last longer than one year because of high mercury levels.

Future threats

According to estimates, 400 million CFL units will be operational beginning 2012 which can cause more harm to the environment if the mercury content remains unregulated. However, experts are hopeful that a regulation will be soon in place.

“The Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) is in the process of finalising the standards for checking the mercury levels in CFLs. The standards will bring down the mercury level to 5 miligram per bulb,” said Sunil Pandey, an environmentalist with the Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), Delhi.

Brands such as Philips and GE should be preferred over locally produced CLFs till regulations are gazetted on paper as brands limit the mercury content to a great extent, he added.

via Glowing mercury, growing panic.

Read More

Thumbs Up for Lamp Recycling!

January 11, 2012   nlrgreen   No comments
thumbs-up

Fluorescent lamp recycling for a business of any size has its positives that far outweigh not recycling and just going on with business as usual. There are positives that can be quantified, ones that can be physically seen and still others that have long reaching effects.

  • Through tracking and reporting a business can have a total of all their recycling efforts across one or multiple sites. This will allow them to be able to craft a more effective lamp recycling program by being able to pin-point which program (bulk or mail back) is right for them.
  • The bottom line. As with most things there is a charge for lamp recycling, but the cost is less than fines that can be assessed for improper management. Would a company rather pay $49 for a pre-paid recycling program that eliminates their liability or would they rather pay hundreds of dollars in fines for the same material that wasn’t recycled?
  • By collecting and correctly storing used lamps a business can reduce their liability for breakage, environmental breach, and possible employee injury
  • Recycling is both environmentally and corporate responsible. Recycling lamps keeps mercury out of our landfill and in turn out of the water and food sources that can directly impact our health
  • A lamp program can help a business increase their green image as well as convey a message of environmental stewardship to their employees and customers. Businesses can set up a company-wide recycling drive for all their employees or use their total lamp recycling numbers to quantify how much mercury was kept out of the environment. Real “Green Press” is green gold in today’s PR world.
  • Simply-Its the law and the right thing to do.

 

Read More

The darker side of power-efficient CFL’s bright story

November 08, 2011   nlrgreen   No comments

While the government is aggressively marketing Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFLs) at subsidised rates across the state in a bid to promote use of these power-efficient bulbs and save some electricity, it seems to have spared little thought for safe disposal of mercury-laden lamps.

Early this year, the government launched Bhachat Lamp Yojana under which it has been marketing CFLs at subsidised rates, but it is yet to make a proper policy for safe disposal of CFLs.

The Bangalore Electricity Supply Company (BESCOM) has distributed CFLs to more than 1 lakh households in Kolar and Bangalore rural areas so far.

According to experts, if the mercury-laden lamps are not disposed off safely and continue to be dumped in the landfills, they may cause several health hazards such as neurological disorders and cancer.

 

Though use of CFL is in its initial stage in India and the issue of unsafe disposal is yet to take alarming proportions, experts say, prevention is better than cure. They fear in the absence of a proper disposal system and necessary awareness, dumping of used CFLs in the landfills will gradually become a common practice.

 

And people will end up unknowingly poisoning the ground water and exposing themselves to several health hazards. As per the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB), IT companies and private institutions are the highest users of CFLs in the city.

 

“The big corporate houses in Bangalore use CFLs, however, 90 per cent of the CFL waste is directly being dumped onto the landfills,” said A S Sadashivaiah, KSPCB chairman. The pollution panel, however, claims that it is currently working with the city entrepreneurs, BESCOM and BBMP to set up a separate CFL waste collection unit.

 

A single CFL bulb contains around 4 to 5 mg of mercury, which is highly toxic and can cause serious health hazards. “We have to first learn how to handle the CFL as a waste. It contains mercury and if it is disposed off in landfills, the groundwater will get contaminated and cause serious neurological and reproductive damage.

It can even cause cancer,” said Dr Thuppil Venkatesh, Principal Investigator, National Referral Centre for Lead Poisoning in India (NRCLPI). He added, “Since CFLs are energy efficient, they are bound to become popular into the rural areas as well. However, in the absence of a safe disposal method, rural areas may turn into polluted lands.”

NGOs working on environmental issues have questioned the entire waste management policy of the government. “Currently, all the waste is mixed together at the landfill and once the rain comes, it seeps into the ground or makes it way into the water bodies,” said environmentalist Suresh Heblikar of Eco-Watch.

He also added that the government needs to introduce policy to check the mercury contents in the CFL bulbs, as in many cases, they are way above the permissible limits.

Layman’s guide for CFL disposal

If there is no place to recycle your CFL bulb, seal it in a plastic bag and put it in the trash.

Don’t burn a CFL bulb, or for that matter anything that contains mercury

via The darker side of power-efficient CFL’s bright story.

Read More

Vu1 to Sell Mercury-Free Light Bulbs in Lowe’s Stores, CEO Says – Bloomberg

November 03, 2011   nlrgreen   1 Comment

Vu1 Corp. (VUOC), a U.S. developer of mercury-free lights, will sell its energy-efficient bulbs at Lowe’s Cos. stores in its first deal with a major retailer, Chief Executive Officer Scott Blackstone said.

Lowe’s, with more than 1,700 stores across the U.S., Canada and Mexico, will initially sell the bulbs online and then in its shops next year, Blackstone said by phone from New York. While sales of the lights, which are about 70 percent more efficient than incandescent bulbs, are currently limited to “sampling,” there’s potential to generate “serious volumes,” he said.

Vu1, based in New York, is seeking to win a share of the lighting market as the U.S. introduces new efficiency standards next year that will cut the use of most traditional incandescent bulbs. The new rules may add $4 billion to U.S. light bulb sales in the three years through 2014, according to estimates from London-based researcher Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

The deal with Lowe’s, the largest U.S. home-improvement retailer after Home Depot Inc., is a “huge jump up,” Blackstone said. Vu1 is also in talks with electrical distributors to sell bulbs to businesses, and aims to announce more agreements by the end of the year, he said.

Vu1’s bulb, which can be dimmed, will sell at $14.98, according to a company statement. While that exceeds the $12-to- $13 cost of a comparable dimmable compact fluorescent bulb, it lasts longer, is mercury-free and produces every wavelength of light, the CEO said. Lowe’s will sell the bulb online from Dec. 1 and in its stores from February, according to the statement.

Efficiency Tradeoff

“Fluorescent technology is missing certain colors; that’s the tradeoff for efficiency,” Blackstone said. “The majority of people want to be environmental, just not in a way that makes their house look bad.”

While Vu1’s bulbs meet the new standards, they’re less efficient than compact fluorescent lamps, or CFLs, and light- emitting diodes, according to Tom Rowlands-Rees, an analyst at New Energy Finance. If they produce a similar quality of light to old incandescent bulbs, they may find a market, he said.

“Vu1’s bulb could be an option for those consumers that are not convinced by the light output of CFLs and LEDs but are no longer able to buy incandescent bulbs due to the standards,” Rowlands-Rees said in an e-mail.

via Vu1 to Sell Mercury-Free Light Bulbs in Lowe’s Stores, CEO Says – Bloomberg.

Read More

Faster, Cheaper Mercury Test Could Provide Answers for China – MarketWatch

October 06, 2011   nlrgreen   No comments

 

SALT LAKE CITY, Oct 06, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Mercury pollution is a big problem, and it’s only getting bigger. It is most pronounced in developing countries like China and India, where coal-burning still remains a major resource of power generation. Worldwide, about 1,000 tons of mercury is produced per year. The resulting pollution makes water and soil unusable, and poses substantial health risks to people nearby.

University of Utah researcher Ling Zang hopes to address this growing problem in China and beyond with a new test for detecting mercury. The test promises to be faster and cheaper than conventional tests, which require samples to be sent to a laboratory, can take weeks to process and can cost hundreds of dollars.

“It’s very exciting as a scientist to be able to transfer what you are developing on the bench-top in the lab to the marketplace, and to serve society,” said Zang, who was recruited to the university’s Department of Material Science and Engineering in 2008 by the Utah Science Technology and Research (USTAR) initiative. USTAR is a state office that drives innovation and economic growth by attracting talented researchers to Utah.

“One of the main reasons I decided to move to University of Utah was the level of support for commercialization at this university,” Zang added. “It is essential to have support from the faculty, the administration and the state to increase the impact of new technologies on people’s lives.”

The inspiration for the new mercury test came four years ago, when Zang was reading an article about how mercury binds to DNA, causing irregularity of genetic processing. He identified the strong, specific binding between mercury and the DNA base thymine, and discovered a way to use this binding to measure mercury concentrations.

After years of work, Zang has proven his new test, and he is close to selling it to companies and governments across the world that want to monitor mercury pollution. The test can detect mercury down to 0.20 parts per billion (ppb), which is well below the Environmental Protection Agency’s standard of 2 ppb for drinking water. The cost of running the analysis has yet to be determined, but it is expected to cost a fraction of existing tests.

The new test starts with a liquid solution of a perylene dye, which emits a green fluorescent light. Zang attached the mercury-binding group to the perylene, so when mercury is added, the liquid becomes less fluorescent. The less fluorescent the liquid, the more mercury is present. To measure the fluorescence, Zang uses a custom handheld photodetector, an electronic device that measures light.

Zang is commercializing his test through a startup company called Metallosensors, Inc. The company launched in 2009, and now has the leadership and money needed to refine and market the test. Metallosensors was awarded a $150,000 phase I SBIR (Small Business Innovation Research) grant from the National Science Foundation. Next year, the company will apply for the $500,000 Phase II SBIR. In addition, Metallosensors recently secured a $50,000 VIP (Virtual Incubator Program) grant from the University of Utah.

The CEO of the company is Glenn Prestwich, a veteran entrepreneur — co-founder and chief science officer for five University of Utah startup companies — and Presidential Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the U.

“Our molecular sensor has enormous potential,” Prestwich said. “In the short term, we are perfecting the underlying chemical test, developing the handheld photodetector with partners in China, establishing a marketing plan in China, and securing intellectual property protection. We are also engaging with Utah’s Mercury Working Group to develop products for monitoring in the United States. In the future, we hope to make the test smarter by adding GPS and real-time graphical displays. This will significantly improve the way we track mercury pollution.”

Metallosensors got an early boost from the Venture Bench program of the University of Utah’s Technology Commercialization Office (TCO). This program helps early-stage university startups such as Metallosensors by creating a temporary management team that allows them to apply for an SBIR grant. Venture Bench also provides marketing materials, including a website and logo.

“Metallosensors is a big success for the Venture Bench program,” said Rajiv Kulkarni, Associate Director at the TCO who has helped Metallosensors through the patent and commercialization process. “The technology is very promising, and the company product line addresses a real need to monitor contamination, especially in developing countries. The portability of the instrument will make it very convenient for field use.”

Learn more about Metallosensors at www.metallosensorsinc.com . Learn more about technology commercialization at the University of Utah at www.techventures.utah.edu .

SOURCE: University of Utah

Faster, Cheaper Mercury Test Could Provide Answers for China – MarketWatch.

Read More

  • NLR TWEETS