Originally Posted by
renogaw
if you're making that claim on the powerplants, you must know because i sure dont.
i do know though that connecticut is having a major problem with mercury in our water because of improper disposal of items that contain mercury. it is to the point that our atny general banned all those kiddy toys coming in cereal boxes if their batteries contained mercury, they banned mercury powered thermostats, and all towns have to have hazardous material drop of days every once in a while if they don't have a waste depot people can drop these items off to.
people aren't going to realize (or care?) that these bulbs have mercury and they have to dispose of them properly
Some of the Mercury sources are Medical waste incinerators, Manufacturing processes (Cement and Chlorine plants)Mining And power plants, coal fired being the single largest source. About 40% of the Mercury in the environment is naturally occuring.
A lot of the sources of the Mercury have already been eliminated. Most batteries used to have it, now only one specific type does. There are regulations on incinerators and they can now make Chlorine without it.
Problem is that once the nasty stuff gets in the water it takes a very long time to work its way out of the food chain.
As far as the light bulb go PC lamps don't have a whole lot of Mercury in them compared to standard fluorescents and T5's have even less. I just looked and one company has a PC lamp that has the light output of a 75~100 watt bulb and they have 2.5 mg of Mercury in them. As the lamp ages a lot of the Mercury gets absorbed in the phosphores and electrodes in the lamp so an old bulb that gets broken isn't going to put a lot of it into the air.
Here's what the fluorescent lamps have in them now. Notice the 1988 reduction.
Lamp Amount (mg.)
Pre 1988 T-12 ~45
Post 1988 T-12 ~11.6
Typical T8 ~4 to 5
Low Mercury T8 ~3
CFL ~4 to 5
So it isn't like these things are spewing large amounts of Mercury into the air. PC's still suck for reef use but they are great for your house lamps