Frankly, I was blown away after finding out that the CFL’s contained mercury and when first being sold, no one mentioned that the disposal of these bulbs is an important issue in the “sustainablity” side of using them.
I felt perplexed and angry over this new technology. I read a response from an article in O magazine, Ocober 2008 issue. Shedding Some Light. Which helped me to understand the big picture a little better.
One woman wrote in to O with feeling more less my feelings. The next month O got a response from Lauren ” Schmitt Olabisi PHd, an environmental scientist.
“As an environmental scientist who works with energy issues, I ‘m writing in response to the reader who had concerns about the mercury in CFL’s. In fact, the amount of mercury contained in these bulbs is very small compared to the mercury released into the air when coal is burned to generate electricity (coal provides about 1/2 of our electricity nationally). You reduce the amount of electrity you use when you install the CFL ’s, you are cutting back on carbon and mercury. ”
With this said, we still need to be aware and recycle these. Home Depot now has a national in store recycling prgram, go to homedepot.com/ecooptions and visit energystar.gov/cfls to learn more about our options.
What I started to do is I designated a show box for old batteries, bulbs and other things I am not sure what to do with. When it is full, I start to research to find the best options to dispose/recylcle them. Office Depot has a program where you can purchase special recycle boxes, fill them with all of your computers and gadgets, take the box to office depot and they will ship it for free to the appropriate recycling stations.
I have just read an article writen in this months Consumer Report (Oct 2008) that confirms, you just never know what is really anymore. Everytime I think we have something we can “trust” I find that it isn’t as we thought it should be, or how they say it is. Bottom line on the article of the Energy Star Labeled appliances.
1. Qualitying Standards are lax. Approx. 25% in a category should qualify, it now about 50% pass the standard
2. Companies test themselves, and not always using a product the way it will be used. No independent verification is done.
3.Test are out of date the DOE, (Dept of Energy) does not have enough staff to do test on new procedures. Plus it takes up to three years to get to publish new rules.
4. Suggestions have been made to use the European Unions Energy label system of grading from A to G that way you could find the best and know which are barley making the cut. Usually the more efficient cost more, but the consumer does not know which is the more efficient.
A settlement in 2006 was reached after the NRDC (natural resource defence council) and several states sued the DOE to create new energy standards.
Why is it that we are paying of these agencies to find out that nothing is as it seems? At this time, it is not just a governement thing, the same thing is happening on Wall Street, and with many private companies. Who cares? The bottom line is the only thing that is important. oh, and the easy way..
3.
I hope that by sharing my work and thoughts about my work, my clients will have a better idea of what my work is about, the good, bad and boring parts of putting great design together.
We did this back in 2000 +or -. We had a contest in a local paper in the burbs for a makeover of one room of someones house. We had many people write in, why they deserved this, and our winner was a very cool single mom, who just finished her breast cancer treatments. It was a no brainer to choose her for the makeover. We really enjoyed doing this project. Amazing what some paint and good energy can do.
My painter, Enrique, volunteered his time to do the painting for this, sanded and sprayed all of the furniture at his shop, thanks to him, and Margo, the place turned out awesome
