Hello,

I've been reading more and more about these CFLs, and I do have one concern. I suffer from debilitating migraines, and fluorescent light is one of my worst triggers. I have spoken with several other migraine sufferers, and they have expressed the same concerns that I have. At work, I have asked to have the fluorescent lights over my desk turned off, and I am not alone. Increasingly, people around my office have discovered that their migraines are caused, in part, by the unhealthy light cast by fluorescent light. While I appreciate the environmental concern with regular incandescent light, I am not willing to suffer needlessly. For private spaces, I encourage people to use energy efficient light. However, in public spaces, I think we should consider that fluorescent light is a source of significant pain for many people.

Thanks!

Adrienne :-)

CFLs have their place, I agree, and I have several at home.

HOWEVER -- what is NOT mentioned 90% of the time is that CFLs contain Mercury and simple disposal into the garbage can of millions upon millions of these bulbs will once again get mercury back into our environment at eleveated levels.

PLEASE warn others. Dead/burned out CFLs need to be treated as toxic waste.

Thanks.

Kristin,

Thank you for pointing out the issues involved with disposal of CFLs due to their mercury content. Here is an excerpt from Eartheasy.com which I think lends good guidance on the potential hazards of CFLs and their proper disposal:

"Compact fluorescent bulbs contain small amounts of mercury. The mercury poses no threat while in the bulb, but if you break one be careful not to inhale the mercury - immediately use a wet rag to clean it up and put all of the pieces, and the rag, into a plastic bag.

Although household CFL bulbs may legally be disposed of with regular trash (in the US), they are categorized as household hazardous waste. As long as the waste is sent to a modern municipal landfill, the hazard to the environment is limited. However, CFL's should not be sent to an incinerator, which would disperse the mercury into the atmosphere.

The best solution is to save spent CFL's for a community household hazardous waste collection, which would then send the bulbs to facilities capable of treating, recovering or recycling them. For more information on CFL disposal or recycling, you can contact your local municipality.

Although CFL's have these handling and disposal issues, the large energy savings of CFL bulbs compared to incandescents is of greater overall environmental benefit."

Hope that helps.

Matthew

Although not a completely retrieved memory, I recall reading about the deleterious neurological effects of fluorescent lighting about 25 years ago, as evidenced by some folks migraines mentioned here. The lights “strobe”, which putatively causes various problems for the human animal, seizures among them.

I do many things on a daily basis for the environment, but I see no reason to compromise my heath, or the health of all who visit. To me, it would be akin to “battery”, purposefully, knowingly, and intentionally harming another individual. Yikes. Just can’t do it.
RH King

Thank you for airing the mercury issue

Two additional/better solutions come to mind with the issue of adequate lighting at minimal impact. First, daylighting, ie: we need to encourage builders to make it a standard practice to construct buildings which beneficially use outdoor light to light the interior of the building during day time use. and Second, LED lights. While still working the bugs out with this fairly new (to residential use that is) type of light. They will I think become the most environmentally beneficial solution for interior lighting. I don't think they are yet available for your standard "light bulb" but they have under cabinet lights, wall sconces, hanging ceiling lights, etc. And they do not contain any Mercury!

Adrienne wrote: I suffer from debilitating migraines, and fluorescent light is one of my worst triggers.

I hear you on that; but it seems this is unavoidable at the typical sedentary deskjob we are involved with. Though there is a choice for the night - dont use em! aka sleep since the night is meant for rest & rejuvenation. I think we're the only species that thinks its cool to associate the night with having fun or etc.

The problem I have with these light bulbs is that those that I picked up contained mercury and urged safe disposal. Because of that I quit buying them.

I've used CF bulbs for 9 years, for all but reading lights, with no problem. (Although I understand perfectly well how people with migraines or sensitivity should avoid them.)

However, a CF bulb, made by GE (not swirl but with straight tubes sticking out) burnt out on me yesterday. It was about 5 years old. It didn't blow like a regular bulb and must've gone through the flicker phase when I was out walking the dog. When I got back in the room, I thought my electric heater was melting down, but it smelled even worse, like a transformer was melting down in my room. I didn't know what it was! The heater didn't smell. My electrical circuit breaker panel didn't smell. Now outlets failed. It was a horrible, toxic stench and made me feel awful. Now it is the next day and I'm worried I may have breathed something toxic as I had a very strange sleep last night. After I discovered it was the lamp, I opened a window, but it was very cold out. Now, the next day, the room still sinks, but nothing like when the bulb was burning. Where the tube inserts into the base of the bulb, there are black char marks all around it. I'm searching on the web to see if any one else has had this experience with a burned out CF bulb. Before this, I was a fan of these bulbs but now I wonder if they are worth the risk.

I too have had a similar burnout issue with a swirl cfl. It did flicker and ther was a small pop sound and then there were a few smoke vapors that were emmitted. I turned off the light, unscrewed the bulb and notice small smoke tendrils eminatting from the bulb. The stench associated with this was terrible. I am assuming that this is burn off from the mercury....troubling in itself, but I do not like the lack of info on the web regarding the phenomenon. Looking for more info....

I, too, get migraines triggered by fluorescent lights, particularly when they go through that "strobing" phase when wearing out. The problem is bad enough that I avoid many stores, and work at home. I saw on the news the other day that the US wants to BAN incandescent light bulbs and REQUIRE compact fluorescent bulbs, even at home. Is there any other choice for energy efficient lights that won't hurt me?

Hey people! Mellow out!

The smell omitted from CFL's is NOT mercury. There is a semiconductor board in the base of every CFL that might be the culprit.

The smell is most likely coming from a over-heated capacitor or resistor. When a semiconductor heats up too much or burns out, it omits a really strong odor.

It's an "electrical" smell that you can't identify normally and it can fill a room up in a flash. don't panic. Get rid of the bulb, open a window & leave the room.

Most CFL's emit some odor but it's the plastic & electrics in the base, not the mercury. Why am I so sure? Because mercury is an oderless element.

My shop replaced most all of our bulbs with CFL's last year and the savings represented 1/2 of our electric usage the year before. It's worth checking out. I still use Edison bulbs at my desk for reading (task) light. I find mixed use best.

Good luck!

"Why am I so sure? Because mercury is an oderless element."

If it's odourless how do you know it is not also being emitted ?

I too have experienced the stench caused by these bulbs "burning out", the last one went out with a bang, followed by white smoke and a horrible smell that hung around for a while. The bulb started to flicker about 30 minutes before it quit, but we thought it was the A/C or something ;-)

So is there really no way for the mercury to escape unless the bulb is broken?

Has anyone run into CFL's flashing when there shouldn't be power running to it?

My first thought was that there was poor wiring for my hallway light switch, but I wondered if a CFL could hold the power longer if it was getting old?

Any thoughts?

Yes. Our 13yo daughter went hysterical because there was an odd flashing from a light that was meant to be off.

I just installed some CFLs in my office for the first time and after 45 minutes or so, I had the migraine of the century. I'm taking those bulbs out today. Sigh...