Toxic mercury: fluorescent or incandescent light bulbs. What’s better?

William Atkins
Sunday, 05 October 2008 23:12

Science - Energy

However, if a person lives in a region that uses cleaner burning power plants (when compared to coal), then such persons are better off to use incandescent bulbs because in the long-run they emit less mercury into the environment.

The Science News article states, “The opposite would be true — overall mercury emissions to the environment would rise — as CFLs replace incandescent bulbs where the local power primarily comes from hydro, nuclear or other virtually mercury-free electricity sources (even some low-mercury coal). Think Alaska, California, Oregon, Idaho, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine and Rhode Island.”

Julie Zimmerman, a co-author of the study, states, “The places known for sustainability are the places that have the potential to do the most harm by bringing this technology in.” [American Chemical Society: “Do compact fluorescent bulbs reduce mercury pollution?”]

She adds, “If we want to be truly sustainable, we can’t be dependent on materials that use toxic substances. We need to look toward safe LEDs [light-emitting diodes] or better CFLs.”

The research, the first of its kind, is not the final verdict as to whether incandescent light bulbs or compact fluorescent light bulbs are better for the environment.

However, their research does indicate that, overall, the use of compact fluorescent light bulbs will reduce mercury emissions from coal power plants and generally reduce the amount of mercury emitted into the atmosphere (and the environment, in general).

However, they do not decrease mercury emissions in all parts of the world.

The researchers also state that better technologies will build more efficient, safer CFLs with less mercury (and maybe ultimately without any toxic materials), which will eventually help to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases into the environment by such light bulbs.

In addition, they state that the further increase of recycling of such CFLs, along with all other fluorescent bulbs, will help to reduce the amount of mercury that goes back into the environment.