Alternative to Mercury Vapor Flourescent Bulbs

Alternative to Mercury Vapor Flourescent Bulbs

www.worldchanging.com

An accidental discovery at Vanderbilt University may well be the key to making light-emitting diodes the dominant lighting technology of the century. Up until very recently, the only way to make "white" light was to add yellow phosphors to bright blue LEDs. It wasn't quite right, though, as even the best "white" LED retained a blue tint. This week, we got the news that a chemistry grad student at Vanderbilt has stumbled on a way to make broad-spectrum white LEDs using quantum dots -- and in doing so, he may well have kicked off a revolution.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Everyone is going crazy over the new lighting standard coming in the next couple years, we must first realize that there are many alternatives to the mercury tainted flourescent bulbs we are seeing everywhere.

First off, these things are ridiculous, I work as a HAZMAT certified Designated Responder for the largest shipping company in the World, and our number one, worst case scenario in our hubs involves "Mercury!" One gram of the substance released on our premises will shut down a building at a cost of $35,000.00 an hour, and require a full building cleanup to prevent any exposure to the workforce. This stuff is very dangerous, causes many problems in the human body.

Our government is retarded, no doubt about it, they have absolutely no foresite whatsoever. Concerning the bulbs everyone is pushing now, don't buy them, if you are concerned, save up $100.00 and go buy some incadescents in bulk. I do this every year and a $100.00 should last you a few years, based on the average household.

Check out the link to the new LED's with the nano dots, these have been around for over a year and the universities and industry are attempting to make them for the mainstream public, not to mention that these LED's last a very long time and are cheap to operate.

Just an IDEA....there is always an alternative!

www.worldchanging.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

I think we've gotten a bit overboard about mercury. Yes, it's poisonous. This has been known for centuries. However, it's not as bad as some would claim.

As a kid I played with mercury blobs all the time, had all sorts of mercury. I'd go to radio stores to get their old mercury batteries, just so I could get the mercury out of them. I'm still here.

Not saying it's something you should mess with; and in organic form, it can cause severe disability or death. There was a town in Japan called Minamoto, where the people were exposed to methyl mercury. It resulted in hundreds of people becoming blind or developing neurologic problems, many of them dying.

Still, the amount found in the energy-saving bulbs isn't much. I haven't seen any studies done, but it wouldn't surprise me to find that that tiny bit of mercury is more than offset by the reduced amount of pollutants released in powering the bulb.

As for other technology, I am skeptical. It seems that every time we find a solution to a problem, that solution creates another problem - often worse than the one it "solved".

Originally posted by ARNETT 187

First off, these things are ridiculous, I work as a HAZMAT certified Designated Responder for the largest shipping company in the World, and our number one, worst case scenario in our hubs involves "Mercury!" One gram of the substance released on our premises will shut down a building at a cost of $35,000.00 an hour, and require a full building cleanup to prevent any exposure to the workforce. This stuff is very dangerous, causes many problems in the human body.

You've probably heard the "and we used to play with mercury when we were kids" stories. Well those stories are true because I fooled around with little puddles of mercury too....many years ago.

Still, I detest being forced to wade into the fluorescent tsunami headed our way. Here's hoping this LED is the beginning of the end of that awful fluorescent light. Thanks for the article.

Disclaimer: I have commercial interest in led tech.
(the sort of disclaimer those honest politicians always use eh ;P)

Your average cfl has between 5 and 30 milligrams of mercury. Not much you think but multiply that by the population of your average city, 10 lights a pop and we're looking at problems... most of the mercury is absorbed by phosphor coating towards the end of its life, however we see most cfl bulbs die prematurely as they are shockingly built, thrashed on a dimmer circuit or abused.

Auckland, New Zealand: Rough population of 1 million. If each person throws out a prematurely failing 10,000 hr life rated cfl bulb a year, we end up with up to 5000kg of mercury using a minimum figure of 5mg mercury per bulb.

Throw 'away' 5 tonnes.. in the dump?? Anyone wondered where mercury goes to when you put it in that place called 'away'.... it eventually accumulates in the top of the foodchain over time. Us...

Now this is a rough figure and in a small city. Typical commercial fluro tubes are same tech but often vastly better treated, so I would have to say they would not contain as much mercury at end of life as they're properly dead by then (mercury absorbed into phosphor).

If we start recycling cfls like some places, (even though they [cfls] cut mercury emissions in a coal fired power grid by 75% compared to incandescent), recycling may take more energy than they save... no one has the numbers on this, yet we walk blindly into it.

I could go on and on about the negative sides: UV hypersensitivity, circadian rythyms, pulse rate, high frequency em fields, cri index of light, lifespan, productivity etc etc but the fact of the matter is that over time, mercury is not good in any way, shape nor form to the human body. This in mind, I have had the pleasure of putting my finger into a jar of mercury... amazing stuff and very heavy and 'wet/cold' feeling.. weird hehe.

I'm watching the led 'green light' revolution closely and will be moving into a mainstream info campaign for my business in the future, the LED turning point is fast approaching, education is the only barrier.

edit: cfls have a much larger resource footprint simply to construct over a traditional bulb also: electronic component soldering, fancy twist, phosphor coating, mercury added etc etc.

[edit on 7/10/09 by GhostR1der]