The proper steps to cleaning up a broken bulb are as follows.

1. Wear disposable rubber or plastic gloves (if available). Use a couple pieces of stiff paper to carefully scoop up the glass shards and as much powder as possible. “Do not use your hands; the shards are sharp and the powder contains mercury.” If you are not sure on a clean up procedure call the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency Duty officer at (800) 422-0798.”
   
   
2. Wipe the area with a damp rag to pick up remaining little pieces and any remaining powder residue. You can also use a sticky surface like duct tape to pick up small pieces of glass, do not use a vacuum until all powder and glass has been cleaned up.
   
   
3. Place everything you picked up and used in the cleanup process in a plastic bag along with the gloves you wore and seal it tightly, then put in another bag and seal. Keep this in an outside storage location until you can take it to your county’s household hazardous waste facility. It is illegal to throw mercury bulbs in the garbage or landfill. To help keep mercury from being placed in our landfills, North Itasca Electric Co-op. accepts fluorescent bulbs from our customers. We collect and store the bulbs in cardboard drums and about once a year Mercury Technologies of Minnesota comes and picks them up. We will not accept broken bulbs that are not properly sealed!
   
   

Cleaning up a HID Lamp

HID or “high intensity discharge lamps” are often used outdoors to provide security lighting and they contain more mercury than florescent lights, from 20 to 100 mg. The mercury is sealed in a glass or quartz capsule that has wire leads. This capsule is protected by an outer glass covering. If the inner capsule is intact, the damaged lamp should be double sealed in a plastic bag and taken to the household hazardous waste facility. However, if the inner capsule has been broken and the powder has ended up on the ground, it will be impossible to recover the mercury. In this case just pick up the pieces of glass and put them in the trash outdoors. If the capsule containing the mercury was broken above or on a hard surface use the same cleanup as with the fluorescent bulbs mentioned above.

Help keep mercury out of our lakes. One of the most serious ways people are exposed to mercury is through eating contaminated fish. You can buy products such as fever thermometers with no mercury instead of similar products made with mercury. We can also make sure that when we purchase things with mercury in them like fluorescent bulbs, some ballasts, video equipment, TVs and a lot of electronic equipment that we find out where to dispose of them safely. If you are not sure where to dispose of something contact the place where you purchased it from, they can normally help you find out where to get rid of it.

Thanks for doing your part!