The shocking truth about those CFL lamps the EPA wants to force you to use

[Alex Murphy]

On the site since 1995? That’s 2 years before FR was launched. And you lurked all those years until last month? BS.

When I think of all of the critical political issues that have come and gone over the last seventeen years (nineteen, if we're counting back to 1995), I have to agree. Above all else, CFL lightbulbs prompts you to post?

[Truthoverpower]

Mercury is an insidious poison. Look into it and get back to me. It doesn’t
Kill you instantly but does severe damage like nuclear ions.
And the fact is these things ALL fluorescents are terrible for the eyes to work under everything. Its time to change. It is important. It’s where everyone has to work play shop it’s called lights And putting millions of tons of mercury into our world and the EPA blatantly lying about these thing for 50+!years and shilling for GE has got to stop

[Cicero]

Yes, but the wood and pellet stoves heat more cheaply than the power company.

[Peet]

That way they will be properly disposed of by people who know how.

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Mail ‘em to your senator/congressthing?

[Peet]

“Mercury is fun.”

Used to get it out of the old thermostats. We called it “quick silver”

The ironic thing about CFL threads is the memory of the lib-tards foaming at the mouth about mercury thermometers. I still have mine but, boy, did they all make an effort to get every last one out of our houses...

Long-term exposure causes problems. See origin of the phrase "mad as a hatter."

Also see Edison's manufacture of light-bulbs using mercury pumps to evacuate the bulbs and his technicians' loss of teeth (among other problems).

Yeah, we played with the stuff as kids too.

[Peet]

I have a friend whose house caught fire from a CFL. The fire inspector told him CFLs are dangerous.

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Funny, that. Every CFL I have replaced (with an edison) had brown or blackened plastic at the base. One was warped because the plastic had softened; another actually sparked and burned.

I’m back on edison bulbs until LED bulbs come down in price. At the moment Home Depot has LED floodlights (CFLs are useless in the cold) are three times the price of quartz halogen outdoor floods.

As well, edison bulbs stand up better to the power outages/surges we see fairly frequently than CFLs do. Want to bet LED bulbs will have the same fragility CFLs do? (Not the LED themselves, the circuitry needed to step down 120VAC to 5VDC.)

[dayglored]

> Mercury is an insidious poison. Look into it and get back to me. It doesn’t Kill you instantly but does severe damage...

We agree that mercury is a very nasty poison, and its effects are awful.

> ... like nuclear ions.

Could you explain what you mean by "nuclear ions" in this context? Please get technical, as I'm likely to understand it better in technical terms than a mere lay explanation.

> And the fact is these things ALL fluorescents are terrible for the eyes to work under everything.

I hate working under old-style (60Hz) fluorescent lighting -- it flickers, hums, and makes me crazy after half an hour. OTOH, I don't have any problem with high-freq CFLs. There's no discernible flicker or hum, and the color spectrum is more pleasant.

> Its time to change. It is important. It’s where everyone has to work play shop it’s called lights

Personally I favor LED lighting. Incandescents are fine as heaters, not so great as light sources.

> And putting millions of tons of mercury into our world and the EPA blatantly lying about these thing for 50+!years and shilling for GE has got to stop

Well, I'm no particular fan of the EPA. But "millions of tons" from CFLs? That's a heck of a lot of mercury to have been contributed by the tiny amounts of vapor in CFLs, especially if they're being disposed of properly. Let me advise you of something -- this is quoted from the Wikipedia page on Mercury:

Natural sources, such as volcanoes, are responsible for approximately half of atmospheric mercury emissions. The human-generated half can be divided into the following estimated percentages:[88][89][90]

• 65% from stationary combustion, of which coal-fired power plants are the largest aggregate source (40% of U.S. mercury emissions in 1999). This includes power plants fueled with gas where the mercury has not been removed. Emissions from coal combustion are between one and two orders of magnitude higher than emissions from oil combustion, depending on the country.[88]
• 11% from gold production. The three largest point sources for mercury emissions in the U.S. are the three largest gold mines. Hydrogeochemical release of mercury from gold-mine tailings has been accounted as a significant source of atmospheric mercury in eastern Canada.[91]
• 6.8% from non-ferrous metal production, typically smelters.
• 6.4% from cement production.
• 3.0% from waste disposal, including municipal and hazardous waste, crematoria, and sewage sludge incineration.
• 3.0% from caustic soda production.
• 1.4% from pig iron and steel production.
• 1.1% from mercury production, mainly for batteries.
• 2.0% from other sources.

Comment? Specifically, where would you place the ACTUAL contribution -- actual releases of mercury from CFLs into the atmosphere -- in the list above? Please document with cites from sources who are not affiliated with either rabid pro-CFL crusaders like EPA or GE, or rabid anti-CFLs crusaders; something from a neutral peer reviewed science journal would be great.

Thanks!

[Truthoverpower]

Hi! Very thoughtful response. Remember first and foremost I’m talking about the tubes 4 ft. 8 ft. T8 t12. These are the major source for the mercury as they are in every building and have been for 50 yrs or more
CFL lamps use 25000 hz which is very high frequency like radio waves. This causes all kinds of interference with electronic and dirty electricity
Many many folks are harmed by CFLs I can cite case after case- it is more the sensitive and vulnerable but dammit! They count too!

When I’m talking comparison with nuclear ions I’m talking strontium 137. Or cesium 158 or anything unstable which emits gamma or other radiation or neutrons. These Are extremely toxic if ingested. Mercury is much more insidious - you don’t really see the effects right away but it irreversibly binds to places that are supposed to be magnesium and other ions critical for the immune system.
When you look at where mercury is coming from it is Very disingenuous for the EPA to cite power plants and volcanoes which are very far away and all total have made a conc of 1 nano gram per cu mtr. That is 10-9 g

One cfl has 5-20 milligrams. And one t8. Like 40 mg Take one store there might be 1000 t8 lamps. All that need replacing by laypersons once every two or three years. Many break while being removed and replaced

That would be say up to a gram of mercury a year in a confined space
In the back say 10000. cu ft. Or only 400. Cu mtr.

That would be again something like 25 milligrams per cu mtr. Which is 250 000 000 times what the atmospheric conc is. And it doesn’t ever go away so it just chronically poisons folks and they have no idea

the EPA is actively trying to downplay this serious danger and confuse people because they don’t understand either chemistry or epidemiology

Ie dose of the poison and acute vs chronic.

Mercury is a very insidious poison and the greed of the industry and zealousness if the global warming activists knows no bounds

Finally you are correct. LED lights are it. They use computer chips to gernerate photons at 3v dc. The heat mgmt is the major issue but 10 yr warranties are now available.

Cheers.