Is Mercury from a Broken CFL Dangerous?

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Monday, May 21, 2007

More discussion and how to proceed…

Since we posted the discussion about the benefits of CFL’s, we have received a lot of questions about the mercury in CFL's. Specifically, there has been some concern over the possibility that broken CFLs can be an important source of exposures to mercury, a toxic metal and a key component of compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs). Our friends at Treehugger crafted a great answer.

Although mercury is a toxic pollutant, mercury exposures from broken CFLs are not likely to harm you and your family. This is due to several factors, including the amount and duration of your exposures and the specific type of mercury that you are exposed to.

Mercury in CFLs are present as elemental (or metallic) mercury. Once spilled, you can be exposed to elemental mercury by touching it, after which it can be eaten and/or absorbed through your skin. More importantly for health, you can also be exposed to mercury through the air, as elemental mercury vaporizes readily (essentially becomes a gas) and can thus be inhaled into your lungs. Breathing elemental mercury into your lungs is generally more dangerous than if you ate the mercury or absorbed it through your skin. Once inhaled, the mercury vapor can damage the central nervous system, kidneys, and liver.

These toxic effects are why any mercury spill should be handled carefully, including one that results from a CFL breaking. Having said this, careful handling does not mean that expensive or complicated clean-up of the spill is needed or that you should be worried about you or your family's health, if a CFL were to break in your home.

This is because CFLs contain relatively small amounts of mercury -- EPA estimates this amount to be 4-5 milligrams (mg) in a typical CFL. A spill of this amount of mercury is not likely to present any excess risk to you or your family. A quick back-of-the-envelope calculation shows why. [Note: This example is meant only as a quick and dirty example. It is not intended to represent every case nor every situation.] For example, we could imagine the following scenario:

A CFL containing 5 mg of mercury breaks in your child’s bedroom that has a volume of about 25 m3 (which corresponds to a medium sized bedroom). The entire 5 mg of mercury vaporizes immediately (an unlikely occurrence), resulting in an airborne mercury concentration in this room of 0.2 mg/m3. This concentration will decrease with time, as air in the room leaves and is replaced by air from outside or from a different room. As a result, concentrations of mercury in the room will likely approach zero after about an hour or so.

Under these relatively conservative assumptions, this level and duration of mercury exposure is not likely to be dangerous, as it is lower than the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) standard of 0.05 mg/m3 of metallic mercury vapor averaged over eight hours. [To equate these values, we could estimate the average indoor airborne mercury concentration for 8 hours, beginning post-spill at an estimated starting value of 0.2 mg/m3 and decreasing from there. If one assumes the the air exchanges completely in one hour (a fairly standard assumption), then the 8-hour average concentration would be 0.025 mg/m3.]

Even though mercury from the broken CFL is not likely to be dangerous, it would be wise to take extra precautions to minimize mercury exposures. Briefly, the US EPA recommends that:

you immediately open windows to reduce mercury concentrations inside your home;
you do not touch the spilled mercury;
you clean up the broken CFL glass carefully and immediately (but not with your hands or a vacuum cleaner), and
you wipe the affected area with a paper towel to remove all glass fragments and mercury.

EPA further recommends that you place the paper towel and glass fragments in a sealed plastic bag and bring the sealed bag to your local Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) Collection Site.

Written by Helen Suh MacIntosh, Cambridge, MA with Treehugger.com

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Posted by Jordan on 09/12/2011 at 06:45 PM

ohh yea thx. and the tingly feeling got much better. i think ill be fine and thx for your time and support for responding :)

Posted by Janelle Sorensen on 09/12/2011 at 01:47 PM

Jordan- You should call your physician about this. Mercury is a neurotoxicant so it impacts the nervous system. The symptoms you are describing sound like they could be associated, so you should seek some professional medical advice.

Good luck!

Posted by Jordan on 09/11/2011 at 08:14 PM

ok so like i just broke a cfl bulb in my closet last night. i swept up the big chunks of it and vaccumed the rest. i opened all the closet doors and windows nearby but i didn’t leave the room for any time. and in a matter of fact i slept there that night too. i started feeling like this tingly sensation on thr bottom of my left foot sort of ibrating every 5 se onds or so. is it serious? and how long will it tAke to ventalate the room untill i could bring small pets or so in it ?
thanks.

Posted by Jes on 08/07/2011 at 07:07 AM

I had accidentally dropped and broke a CFL bulb in my bedroom just about a few months ago now. The bulb had fallen behind the headboard to my bed and since the bed is rather heavy and the headboard is falling apart I left the glass there for a few days before deciding to try to clean it up. I also hadn’t opened the windows during that time thinking the accident wasn’t that big a deal. OMG was I wrong!!! First I noticed I had an occasional sharp shooting pain in my head when I’d lay down and tried to sleep. This lasted a short time and seemed to go away though I didn’t sleep well in the bed at all. I didn’t think much of it at the time, thought it was not related to the CFL. I just thought the occasional shooting pain was simply part of getting older. Then I began having sharp pain headaches with much drowsiness when I tried sleeping in the bed. The headaches would last for two days even with aspirin. This happened enough times that I knew it just might be related to the CFL bulb that broke so I began reading about the matter and sleeping on the couch in my living room every night. I actually like sleeping on the couch (I live alone) so I’ve slept there now every night for almost three months. Since I’ve cleaned the broken glass in my bedroom a few days after the accident and have left the windows open constantly in my bedroom at the same time I thought I’d try laying down on my bed yesterday thinking enough time had passed and that I’d most-likely be all set! I was wrong. Within 10 minutes (if that) of my laying on the bed I noticed a definite feeling like the bed was at an angle, like the head of the bed was lower than the foot of the bed! That’s the best way to describe the feeling. I had slept on that bed for about a year without any trouble! In fact I LOVED my bed. It was the best mattress I ever bought - a Sealy pillow-top mattress that was VERY comfortable and was expensive. Well, I didn’t stay in the bed long yesterday before I got up and was out of there. By evening I had a headache and needed to take aspirin again. I don’t often get headaches! This morning when I woke I still had the headache along with the familiar feeling of being doped up or drugged. It was the same as I had felt a few months back when trying to sleep in the bedroom so I’m going to use the mercury home test kit I had purchased a few weeks ago! I’ve been putting it off because the instructions aren’t that clear and have seemed complicated a bit. I will use the test kit today or asap.

I decided to post the experiences I’ve had so far for anyone interested or are having similar symptoms after a CFL accident. I will post again on this website if the test kit comes out positive. I will NEVER again buy another CFL bulb for the rest of my life! The more I read about this stuff now the more I’m thinking of getting rid of all the CFL bulbs in my house as well. If I dropped another CFL here I’d be thinking of moving out!

Posted by Bagheera on 02/12/2011 at 12:18 PM

Why would anyone even take the chance? I will never have one of these things in my house. The health of my family is far more important than trying to save an extra dollar. We’ll just use safer alternatives, lower watts, and turn off unnecessary lighting to save on energy.

Who in their right mind would try to force other people to use this kind of thing? It should be banned, just like lead paint, asbestos, and mercury in thermometers.

Posted by jimmys mom on 10/24/2010 at 12:07 PM

I was involved in a major mercury spill while I was pregnant and have been to quite a few doctors as a result and even though the amount in the light bulbs is small if you are pregnant you should still go see your doctor right away. Mercury is one of the the things that actually passes through the placenta to the baby. I would suggest a heavy metal blood test just to see how high your levels are. The worst part about being pregnant is you could have low levels and your baby could have high levels. No matter how many people say “oh we used to play with it in school” mercury VAPORS are very serious.

Posted by Sarah on 07/30/2010 at 04:35 PM

I just found out a room I will be renting for a few days had a CFL break in it a week ago. The landlord said that it just broke but didn’t fall onto the bed. The room has had the window open and the fan on all week. Do you think that the issue is resolved are is there trace mercury left in the room???

Thanks,
Sarah

Posted by Kristen on 06/29/2010 at 10:33 AM

I spoke to my doctor today, she said we are exposed to more toxins in the environment than in one cfl bulb and baby’s turn out fine. She said it’s a negligible amount and not to worry about it.

Posted by Pam on 06/29/2010 at 05:06 AM

I broke a cfl in my bedroom while 28 weeks pregnant. I thought nothing of it until I did a little research on the net. I had my husband clean it up when he got home from work according to the proper procedure, but I’m still pretty freaked out about remaining mercury levels in the rug that I can’t see. Has anyone had a similar situation? Did their babies end up healthy in the end? I have a feeling I’m being paranoid but the worry still lingers that one little stupid mistake could harm my baby.

Posted by Janelle Sorensen on 06/08/2010 at 10:40 AM

Kayla - Breaking a CFL bulb does not make your home un-safe to inhabit. It sounds like you’ve taken the appropriate precautions. But, if you’re still concerned, I would recommend calling your local public health department and/or your family doctor.

Posted by Kayla on 06/07/2010 at 10:11 PM

My cat knocked down the lamp which caused the light bulb to break and I was at work while it happened. My husband vaccumed it up not knowing he should swept it up instead but i did use tape and a damp paper towel to clean up the rest but it was 8 hours or so later because I had no idea how to clean it up properly. And the window is now open but is it harmful? And yes the stuff in the vaccum is gone as is the light bulb. i know there is not much i can do now, but am i safe to live here? as in safe to live in the apartment?

Posted by Kristen on 05/11/2010 at 11:34 AM

Sleepybear,

I did the same exact thing yesterday, handled a broken bulb that I didn’t realize had broken. You must have had your child by now. Any advice or suggestions?

Posted by MA on 03/05/2010 at 10:23 AM

I had a bulb short out and break while I was replacing it and got a big lungful of smelly gas which gave me a headache. Reading this stuff about CFLS and mercury has definitely made me quite nervous.

Posted by ec on 12/23/2009 at 06:24 AM

If the mercury isn’t bad, then why do EPA guidelines say to throw away any bedding and clothing it came in contact with?! Why do they say not to vacuum?! My son is now undergoing six rounds of Chelation treatment due to mercury poisoning we have linked to a broken CFL in a lamp in his bedroom that we did not properly clean up. Perhaps it’s not toxic to all people in the same way but both energystar.gov and the EPA say to throw out that with which it came in contact - doesn’t sound harmless to me! As a mother facing a child with mercury toxicity, I find these to be one of the most dangerous products on the market today! Buyer - beware - especially in your kid’s carpeted bedrooms!

Posted by Janelle on 04/30/2009 at 05:34 PM

Coner, there’s no way to know how much the volatilizing mercury may have impacted your indoor air quality. Most likely, there’s nothing to be too concerned about. If you are still worried, discuss the exposure with your physician.

Posted by sleepybear on 04/30/2009 at 04:34 PM

I noticed a CFL bulb had broken. I was unaware of how long it had been broken, but when I noticed, I had picked it up with my bare hands. I am also pregnant. Could this harm my unborn baby?

Posted by coner on 04/30/2009 at 05:50 AM

I woke up this morning to find a CFL bulb broken in my living room. I bought the bulb to replace a regular bulb. My husband tried to replace the bulb and broke it. He said nothing to me about it. I cleaned up the broken glass and put it in a plastic bag. How much damage has been done having had that broken bulb in the house all night?

Posted by Sky on 02/04/2009 at 10:26 AM

I’ve been hearing more about how much damage will be done when people who do not know about the correct way to dispose of CFLs (or don’t care enough to make the extra effort) start throwing them away in the regular garbage. The probability of them breaking in a regular waste collection area is very high and then we’ve created a huge pollution problem caused my mercury ground seepage and/or vaporization. With talk of our nation moving completely to CFL bulbs in the near future, what is the “official word” on the possibility of large-scale, irreversible toxic damage.

Posted by Janelle Sorensen on 11/03/2008 at 11:31 AM

Joyce, there’s the possibility you could have harmed your lungs, but it would be nearly impossible to know for sure. If you are concerned, I recommend you discuss it with your physician.

Posted by Joyce Good on 11/01/2008 at 01:45 PM

I once broke a CFL and did not know about the mercury. I left it on my counter, broken, for several days before I discovered about the mercury. I then carefully cleaned it up, opened the windows, packed it in two plastic bags and recycled it at a Home Depot in Chicago. I might have opened the window sometime before the several days, but could it have damaged my lungs?
Thanks for the article. Joyce

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