Disposing of Fluorescent Tubes

It is not actually. The mercury content is very hazardous in large amounts. The problem is,as with so many things, a questions of scale. The odd tube here and there discarded into landfill is not in itself likely to be a hazard. Scale that up the millions of tubes discarded each year and it amounts to significant amount of a very toxic material that does not decompose.

Peter Crosland

Reply to
Peter Crosland
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Like everything with the green issue, the whole thing is scewed up. Scale up the millions of tubes discarded every amounts to significant amounts of toxic material has to considered in the context of the thousands of gallons of petrol that will now be burnt by householders taking their old tubes and compact bulbs to the fuse tip. I probabley dispose of one, possibley two tubes a year. I think that I have only had to replace one compact bulb over a period of ten years. Considering the amount of hazardous waste that would generate as a percentage of just the tons of useless packaging I get through in a year verses the trips to the tip that I am now expected to make doesn't make sense. But it is like the criticism levelled this week on the amount of water used by households. With 30% of water lost before it even reaches the tap the environmentalists are levelling their anger at the wrong people.

Kevin

Reply to
Kev

Kev wrote: .

The answer is to use more water: Then the relatively fixed losses of the pipelines will drop to less in proportion :-)

This is the sort of inspired thinking that any government department is expert at.

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

How many uk.d-i-yers does it take to dispose of a fluorescent tube?

Total so far...:

1 to jokingly suggest flushing it down the loo

3 to suggest smashing it and putting it in the bin in a box

3 to enquire about the toxic nature of the tube and it's materials

3 to discuss the properties and alterative uses of the toxic materials

3 to discuss how the toxic materials enable to tube to work

3 to discuss what happens to the toxic materials when the tube is broken

2 to complain about excessive health and safety

2 to complain about the CO2 generated by driving to the tip

1 to complain about the toxic materials being landfilled

1 to propose that the tubes being landfilled isn't a problem

2 to disagree about tubes being landfilled and discuss tube recyling

to be continued...?

Reply to
Pete C

Not usually (_some_ obscure phosphors are hazzardous)

The problem with fluorescents is the mercury vapour in them.

Reply to
Andy Dingley

This is a common market thing hyped up by the tube disposal "industry".

I've seen an advert that just one fluorescent tube contains enough mercury to contaminate 30,000 Cubic Metres of groundwater. What the ad avoided saying is that it the Mercury doesn't actually end up in groundwater most of it gets sequestered by chemicals (Sulphur ?) in the environment.

DG

Reply to
Derek ^

Not far from where I live there's a quite substantial amount of water emerging from a bleb in the middle of a road - obviously a broken water main - where it runs down the hill and down a drain; the road is always wet. Last week I decided to report it to United Utilities - I couldn't believe that somebody hadn't already done so as it had been going for ages, but anyway... (In my defence, had it been in my road I'd have phoned UU straight away, but as there must several hundred homes between me and the leak, I didn't think it was really down to me!).

So, I got through on the phone, and the nice lady said, "Ah yes, we already know about that leak, thanks. Somebody reported it in.... er, August".

David

Reply to
Lobster

In cool conditions it condenses to liquid Mercury. When the tube is running the Mercury vapourises. It is this that is responsible for the warm up delay that cheap compact fluorescents exhibit.

No it's the actual metal of the filaments which gets ripped off the filament surface by the discharge, especially if the filaments aren't hot enough, at start-up for instance, or if the ballast &/or starter doesn't provide enough pre-heat. Eventually this leaves the filaments thin and weak and they break.

Probably the origin of stories that it's cheaper to leave fluorescents on than switch them off.

DG

Reply to
Derek ^

We get very hung up over such issues but consider the environmental damage that arson creates.

Reply to
John

Lavatory cisterns with flap valves waste lost of water.

Reply to
Chris Bacon

I hesitate to jump to their defence, but it can be quite difficult to get permission to close a road for roadworks. Lots of rules about how many times a year and how many different services club together to share the inconvenience, etc. Having said that, they don't really seem to care a great deal if it's a cost to them to do something (you can bet your life if a customer was benefiting from something they'd jump to it!).

a
Reply to
al

In modern tubes, it's tiny though. I saw a discussion of this relating to the World Trade Center collapse. Some of those nearby were concerned they might have got mercury poisoning from the tubes in the building breaking. They might have a small valid concern about mercury poison, but not from the tubes. The mercury released from the teeth fillings of the people who died is orders of magnitude higher. In the UK, it averages 3g per person at the crematorium.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

Actually, it's the emission coating on the filaments, not the metal. Once the emission coating is all sputtered off, the filaments can't transfer enough current into the gas to maintain the discharge, unless the control gear has enough voltage headroom to make the tube operate as a cold cathode tube.

This will happen if the tube continues running in cold cathode mode after the emission coating is all gone. This is dangerous as it will overheat the tube ends, with the possibility of melting the lampholder, igniting something nearby, or causing the glass to crack or melt and the tube falling out. Control gear should ensure a tube which has lost it's emission coating (and is strictly dead) is not allowed to continue operating at higher tube voltages until catastophic failure, although I've certainly got some examples which don't.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

I'd heard this.

Some years ago the dentist showed me a container where he collected left over amalgam filling material recovered from utensils and a filter under the drain of the little spitoon.

It wasn't a large box but weighed several kilos.

I gradually had old childhood fillings replaced until they were all gone. I would have liked to have lost more weight but every little helps.

Reply to
Andy Hall

Sheesh - how many people nowadays have Hg fillings in their teeth? I thought white fillings were "de rigeur".

Or crowns.

Reply to
Frank Erskine

The tubes (unbroken) never fail, only the heaters.

So either build yourself a Tesla coil, or go and live under a Grid powerline and light them up again just with the external field.

Reply to
Andy Dingley

I saw that (too?) on Tomorrow's World :)

But would you be charged with stealing electricity?

Must try it sometime - there's a set of lines just down the road, 'twill amuse the local chavs.

Tim

Reply to
Tim S

You must be spending your pension on private dentistry. Apart from front teeth you only get amalgam fillings (but I haven't had any for about 5 years).

Are gold fillings now out of fashion?

Reply to
<me9

And 1 to comment on the different things people have gone off tangent on. Or have I made that 2 now?

Reply to
mogga

I do. I've still got all my childhood fillings in there. They've done me for 30 years, why would I change them now ?

Or am I going to die soon ;-)

Paul (who doesn't eat toffees ;)

Reply to
zymurgy

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