Fluorescent lighting recycling

What are low energy light bulbs?

Low energy light bulbs (sometimes called Compact Fluorescent Lighting or CFLs) are increasingly used to provide illumination because they save electricity leading to financial savings and environmental benefits.

What are the issues surrounding broken low energy light bulbs?

All fluorescent lighting contains tiny amounts of mercury and is deemed to be hazardous waste. We would request that they are kept out of the refuse as they may present a safety risk in landfill.  Households are technically exempt from the Hazardous Waste Regulations, so its not strictly illegal to put them in your rubbish bin, but it’s environmentally preferable and safer for everyone to take them to a household recycling centre.

How can I recycle them?

The council recommends that low energy light bulbs / fluorescent tubes are taken to one of the household recycling centres (located in Shrewsbury, Oswestry, Bridgnorth, Whitchurch and Craven Arms) where we can arrange for them to be sent on for recycling.

The mercury within the bulbs can be safely recovered and the glass gets recycled. They can't go in the normal glass recycling though because they're Phosphor coated glass, so please don’t place them in bottle banks or your kerbside glass recycling box.

What are the benefits?

Low energy light bulbs last around 10 times longer than traditional bulbs and use only one-fifth of the electricity, thus over their lifetime they prevent the emissions of much more mercury than they cause.  Replacing a single GLS with a low energy lightbulb can save a householder up to £9 per year on electricity bills.  If everyone in the UK replaced just one light bulb with a low energy light bulb it could save enough electricity to close down an entire coal-fired (mercury emitting) power station!

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