Denialism.com

Friday, April 27, 2007

Mercury is only OK from coal-fired plants

I think Steven Milloy has figured out a new way to create anti-environmentalist fear - panic mongering about compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs). Turns out that CFLs, like all fluorescent lights, have small amounts of mercury (in this case about 5mg or about 1/100th the amount in an old mercury thermometer).

How much money does it take to screw in a compact fluorescent lightbulb? About $4.28 for the bulb and labor - unless you break the bulb. Then you, like Brandy Bridges of Ellsworth, Maine, could be looking at a cost of about $2,004.28, which doesn't include the costs of frayed nerves and risks to health.

Sound crazy? Perhaps no more than the stampede to ban the incandescent light bulb in favor of compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs) - a move already either adopted or being considered in California, Canada, the European Union and Australia.

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.

Aware that CFLs contain potentially hazardous substances, Bridges called her local Home Depot for advice. The store told her that the CFL contained mercury and that she should call the Poison Control hotline, which in turn directed her to the Maine Department of Environmental Protection.

The DEP sent a specialist to Bridges' house to test for mercury contamination. The specialist found mercury levels in the bedroom in excess of six times the state's "safe" level for mercury contamination of 300 billionths of a gram per cubic meter.

Notice the fear quotes around "safe"? Makes it sound like Milloy is suggesting there is no safe level of mercury, but back to this in a moment.

The DEP specialist recommended that Bridges call an environmental cleanup firm, which reportedly gave her a "low-ball" estimate of $2,000 to clean up the room. The room then was sealed off with plastic and Bridges began "gathering finances" to pay for the $2,000 cleaning. Reportedly, her insurance company wouldn’t cover the cleanup costs because mercury is a pollutant.

Given that the replacement of incandescent bulbs with CFLs in the average U.S. household is touted as saving as much as $180 annually in energy costs - and assuming that Bridges doesn't break any more CFLs - it will take her more than 11 years to recoup the cleanup costs in the form of energy savings.

See that? Install CFLs and if you break one your house becomes a toxic waste dump! Panic! Mercury!

This is very interesting. For one, people have dealt with household mercury use for a long time in the form of thermometers, and while it's definitely a good thing that those have been phased-out for alcohol thermometers, it's simply not true that mercury spills from fluorescent lights are going to bring about end-times. It's certainly toxic stuff - so are a lot of things you have about the house - but Steven Milloy, purely out of concern for your well-being, simply won't stand for any amount of toxic mercury exposure.

He's also desperately concerned for the environment, unlike Greenpeace.

Greenpeace also recommends CFLs while simultaneously bemoaning contamination caused by a mercury thermometer factory in India. But where are mercury-containing CFLs made? Not in the U.S., under strict environmental regulation. CFLs are made in India and China, where environmental standards are virtually non-existent.

And let's not forget about the regulatory nightmare known as the Superfund law, the EPA regulatory program best known for requiring expensive but often needless cleanup of toxic waste sites, along with endless litigation over such cleanups.

We'll eventually be disposing billions and billions of CFL mercury bombs. Much of the mercury from discarded and/or broken CFLs is bound to make its way into the environment and give rise to Superfund liability, which in the past has needlessly disrupted many lives, cost tens of billions of dollars and sent many businesses into bankruptcy.

...

Not only are CFLs much more expensive than incandescent bulbs and emit light that many regard as inferior to incandescent bulbs, they pose a nightmare if they break and require special disposal procedures. Should government (egged on by environmentalists and the Wal-Marts of the world) impose on us such higher costs, denial of lighting choice, disposal hassles and breakage risks in the name of saving a few dollars every year on the electric bill?

It's true, you shouldn't throw away CFLs if you can avoid it. To recycle CFLs determine the nearest depo by going to earth911 or energystar.gov. But let's think about whether Milloy is being fully honest with us here (haha).

For one, it's very interesting how concerned Milloy is about mercury contamination of the environment when he's consistently taken the position it's harmless when it comes from coal-fired plants. Interesting, but still not a true example of selectivity or deception, just hypocrisy (hypocrisy is ok if you're telling the truth). But is he? Well, no.

Simply go to the GE site on CFLs and they'll give you a nice little discussion about the real risk of mercury exposure:

CFLs contain a very small amount of mercury sealed within the glass tubing - an average of 5 milligrams (roughly equivalent to the tip of a ball-point pen). Mercury is an essential, irreplaceable element in CFLs and is what allows the bulb to be an efficient light source. By comparison, older home thermometers contain 500 milligrams of mercury and many manual thermostats contain up to 3000 milligrams. It would take between 100 and 600 CFLs to equal those amounts.

Note every bulb broken doesn't result in a 2000 dollar clean-up bill unless you're just a total idiot. They also are nice enough to tell us the actual decrease in mercury in the environment as a result of using CFLs:

Mercury is an element (Hg on the periodic table) found naturally in the environment. Mercury emissions in the air can come from both natural and man-made sources. Utility power plants (mainly coal-fired) are the primary man-made source, as mercury that naturally exists in coal is released into the air when coal is burned to make electricity. Coal-fired power generation accounts for roughly 40% of the mercury emissions in the U.S. EPA is implementing policies to reduce airborne mercury emissions. Under regulations issued in 2005, coal-fired power plants will need to reduce their emissions by 70 percent by 2018.

CFLs present an opportunity to prevent mercury emissions from entering the environment because they help to reduce emissions from coal-fired power plants. A coal-fired power plant will emit 13.6 milligrams of mercury to produce electricity required to use an incandescent light bulb, compared to 3.3 milligrams for a CFL.

Even in areas without significant coal-fired power generation as part of the electricity mix (e.g., Alaska and the Pacific Northwest), there are other, equally positive environmental impacts from saving energy through the use of CFLs: reduction of nitrogen oxides (which cause smog), and prevention of substantial quantities of CO2, a greenhouse gas (which is linked to global warming), as well as other air pollutants.

Airborne mercury poses a very low risk of exposure. However, when mercury emissions deposit into lakes and oceans, they can transform into methyl mercury that builds up in fish. Fish consumption is the most common pathway for human exposure to mercury. Pregnant women and young children are most vulnerable to the effects of this type of mercury exposure. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) estimates that most people are not exposed to harmful levels of mercury through fish consumption. However, the FDA and state agencies do issue public health advisories.

Finally the correct way to clean up a home mercury spill without calling in a SWAT team.

Because there is such a small amount of mercury in CFLs, your greatest risk if a bulb breaks is getting cut from glass shards. Research indicates that there is no immediate health risk to you or your family should a bulb break and it's cleaned up properly. You can minimize any risks by following these proper clean-up and disposal guidelines:

Sweep up—don't vacuum—all of the glass fragments and fine particles.
Place broken pieces in a sealed plastic bag and wipe the area with a damp paper towel to pick up any stray shards of glass or fine particles. Put the used towel in the plastic bag as well.
If weather permits, open windows to allow the room to ventilate.

These are the same precautions one takes for any fluorescent lighting, which has been around for quite a while without causing end-times from mercury contamination. It's funny that Milloy who has always accused environmentalists of panic-mongering (which they do) is so willing to do the same to deflect anything that represents societal environmental reform or efforts to prevent global warming. He also will selectively use information to try to create fear of safe and long-implemented technologies such as fluorescent lighting.

Labels: global warming denialism, steven milloy

6 Comments:

S.o.B. said...

True, the Hg in the CFL's is small compared to thermostat mercury switches & old-style thermometers, but problems with the CFL's abound.

The problem I see is the purported method of recycling them: Bringing them *back* to the store where you bought them. Imagine a grocery store trying to safely handle piles of these things in the same backroom as the foodstuffs? I don't want piles of these things being returned in plastic bags (crushed under Johhny's backpack on the way to the store?) and then handled by your average teen.

I tried using CFLs and experienced poor results:

I've had them arc-through & the bulbs crack at the base and fail from lightning surges - so they're nowhere nearly as durable as a thermostat switch, a glass thermometer (typically only one per home) or an incandescent or full-ballast fluorescents (the big long fluorescent bulbs).

Having worked w/ scientists years ago, I remember how the chem labs were very cautious about Hg thermometers, not b/c of the amount, but b/c of the problem of Hg aerosols in the confines of a building, concentrating the exposure (as opposed to open-air dispersal, as with a powerplant smokestack).

I am personally dubious about the purported energy-saving (& hence, Hg-mitigating) benefits of the CFL's. As my CFL's aged, they did what all fluorescent bulbs do and would demonstrate longer and longer start times, flickering for longer and longer periods - such that I kept them on longer and longer so I wouldn't have to endure a 5-minute warm-up when I walked back into a room. I ended up leaving them on for the better part of the day (whereas w/ the incandescents I simply turn them on as-need, so the emitted heat wouldn't duel with the central A/C).

Couple all those problems along with the problem of recycling energy overheads & I'm rather dubious that there's as substantial a benefit to the CFBs as is claimed.

I'm pretty certain, however, there're tangible benefits in CFB manufacture, since the price point on higher prices entails a better profit margin and the tech is still patented.

Sounds like greenwash to me.

May 5, 2007 4:36 PM,

S.o.B. said...

Oh, and I forgot to mention that the standard large-bulb fluorescents with the green terminals are supposed to have *NO* Hg in them at all.

So it came as a surprise to me that the CFBs have Hg in them. We got Hg out of dry-cell batteries, thermometers, thermostats, fish, vaccines & other products, but we're supposed to ignore the issues of Hg contamination in CFBs?

Why not just wait for the LED revolution in the next 5 years? 1500 lumen LED arrays can already be had for $45, will likely last longer than the CFBs and not present a contamination problem (no Pb in the solders, etc.).

If I were a Californian I'd be hoarding incandescents.

May 5, 2007 4:41 PM,

monado said...

Excuuuse me! I have some light fixtures that are not safe for compact fluorescents. Should I just rip them out of the ceiling? Or stock up on 30 years' worth of incandescents?

July 13, 2007 5:10 PM,

Anonymous said...

I am an environmentalist who became so after workplace chemical neurotoxic injury caused photosensitive epilepsy among other complications.

Ironically, this epilepsy is triggered by my lowered CFF (critical flicker frequency threshold) in the presence of the flicker of all flourescent lights, strobe lights, TV, and unmodified CRT computer monitors.

I had to research this when the 2007 Energy Act was signed. It was my Christmas present, knowing that unless I advocated for myself and others, I would literally be in the dark in 2012 when incandescents were phased out.

During my research, I learned that a sizable portion of the U.S. photosensitive disability population stands to be adversely impacted by the medical implications of CFLs. These impairments include those adversely impacted by the UV portion of CFL lighting - lupus, and dermal disorders such as xerostosa pigmentosum. You can die from lupus following florescent exposures. The other effects are primarily neurological and effect such disabilities as traumatic brain injury, photosensitive epilepsy, vestibular disorders, autism spectrum disorders, migraines, scotopic syndrome, fibromyalgia, and myaglic encephalomyelitis, as well as adverse reactions from persons on various medications.

I personally am a newly admitted attorney, who has been unable to worship, go to the doctor, find employment, and am having increasing isolation due to the increasing use of florescents and their adverse impact on my health.

This is a ADA/Rehabilitation Act access issue where persons with photosensitive disabilities are being denied access potentially to even their own homes due to misplaced public policy.

LED lighting with a natural sunlight spectrum friendly to the human physiology is in development and is even longer lasting than CFLs without the mercury fallout. And multiplied millions of lightbulbs don't even compare to a much smaller number of thermometers.

Study the scientific effects of even a minute amount of vaporized (aerosolized) mercury on the CNS of the human body. The last thing we need is more "madness" in our society. Rome learned this to her detriment after putting another heavy metal, lead, in its water supply.

The country fell from its grandeur.

Let's listen to the weakest and most vulnerable among us, and not rush along misplaced zeal however well-meaning the goal. There are other answers besides this wrong one.

July 16, 2008 5:53 PM,

Micah said...

To S.o.B.,

Your imaginary scenario of a grocery store recycling center seems a bit silly. For one, some of your groceries(like the fish products) will likely have traces of mercury in them already. And some that we can thank the coal fired power plants which have been releasing it into the environment for over a century.

And if your personal experience counts as a reference, how about my own?

I tried using incandescents for most of my life and experienced poor results.

They consumed too much power, produced more heat than they did light and frequently burned out. And each time they burn out I have to replace it, and my time is valuable to me.

The CFLs *I* use exhibit no downsides of slow starting or flickering. When I flip the switch, I have bright light. I use a CFL flood light, and even when the temps are near zero, it doesnt take them 5 minutes to 'warm-up', so I am 'personally dubious' about your 'personally dubious' testimony.

To monado,

What fixture 'isnt safe' for CFL usage? If its just a couple, then continue to use incandescent but use CFLs for the rest. Pretty simple. Depending on how you look at it, stocking up on 30 years worth of incandescents will cost much more than 'ripping out' those 'unsafe' fixtures and replacing them with ones that ARE safe for CFLs.

Anonymous,
Yours is a delicate case. However, there are many other people with different ailments which are adversely effected by public interaction. Should the entire population bend to your will? How many people with sensitivities to the emissions from coal fired plants are there? CFLs help their cause, should we ignore them in favor of yours? And what about the billions of lifeforms our polluting ways kill every year(humans included!)? Do we put our own concerns ahead of all that?

I agree, the last thing we need is more madness in society. The 'madness' over 'vaporized' mercury due to a broken CFL is indeed, madness. For one, its nearly impossible that a broken CFL would vaporize ALL of its minuscule 5mg of mercury. 2nd, you would virtually need to fall to the ground and snort over the wreckage to get a significant dose. 3rd, there is a greater danger from being cut by the glass shards than the mercury itself(as already stated). 4th, in a very short period of time, concentrations of vaporized Hg approach zero, and even before that are well below even OSHA standards of concentration. 'Misplaced zeal' indeed.

December 30, 2008 3:26 PM,

Tel said...

Why vent your anger at Milloy? He is merely the messenger.

When Milloy puts quotes around "safe" it shows he is quoting the Department of Environmental Protection. That's what quote marks are intended for: if choice of words is sensitive and you want to make clear you are using the particular word that came from a particular source then you quote that source. Nothing sinister about it, just the normal way that the English language happens to operate.

If you believe that the some different level of Mercury should be considered officially "safe" then by all means make a public petition against the DEP or even go to the federal level, but shooting the messenger fixes nothing.

You accuse Milloy of hypocrisy and not telling the truth, but all Milloy is doing is reporting on the DEP's policy and truthfully bringing to light the hypocrisy of the environmental movement. The Superfund liability that Milloy reports is not his own creation.

Milloy brings up the hypocrisy of the "activist group Environmental Defense" and somehow you blame him for reporting it, as if he created the problem (see how I used quotes there, to quote from the original article).

October 24, 2009 7:07 PM,

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