An expert on lighting, Yu participated in the development of China’s first high-pressure xenon (HID) bulb. He explains that an ordinary energy-saving bulb contains five milligrammes of mercury – just enough to cover the tip of a ball-point pen, and a broken energy-saving bulb can immediately send mercury levels in。
A revised list of hazardous waste types released in 2008 listed domestic fluorescent lights – including energy-saving bulbs – as not requiring handling as hazardous waste. Hundreds of millions of energy-saving bulbs will be disposed of as domestic waste, then, and become a hidden environmental killer. China still has no policy or measures to deal with this issue. Chen Yansheng, head of the China Lighting Association, the surrounding air soaring to over 100 times safety limits. and a single inhaled dose of 2.5 grammes can be fatal.
In the reply he received a fortnight later, his concern was acknowledged. On June 5, 2008, the Ministry of Environmental Protection invited experts to a meeting on the matter, but nothing was decided. noted that China is considering formulating standards for the recycling and disposal of gas-discharge bulbs, but there is no hint of when that might happen. All they can do is reduce the amount of mercury in the bulb and use solid rather than liquid mercury in order to reduce pollution from the manufacturing process.
Yu investigated the market and found that little or no mention is made of mercury pollution. Even in government documents about the popularisation of the bulbs, there is no warning of the dangers. "A lot of people don’t even know that energy-saving bulbs contain mercury," he said.
A company official identified only as Mr Chen said that even a large company like his cannot make these bulbs without mercury.
"There hasn’t been any state evaluation of pollution from fluorescent lighting," says Liu Shu, an engineer from the Beijing Lighting Research Institute’s (BLRI) chemical laboratory. as a key part of China’s Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh Five-Year Plans. Purchases of energy-saving bulbs have been encouraged with generous subsidies, leading to a buoyant manufacturing sector. China has 2,000 registered ，China weighed up the pros and cons of promoting energy-saving bulbs, and this is the best solution overall for saving electricity,energy-saving bulb manufacturing firms, producing 2.4 billion bulbs annually – 85% of global output.
Most of the experts who promoted the project back then were physicists, without much understanding of photoelectric engineering – so the risks of mercury pollution were not considered.
reducing emissions and the advocating of power saving in society as a whole."
He says that power-saving bulbs will result in much lower release of mercury overall within China’s coal-burning power industry. "Each power plant releases one hundred tonnes of mercury every year." [Use of power-saving bulbs, the thinking goes, will mean a reduction in the use of electricity, which comes mainly from coal-fired plants. Most companies indicated that they could dispose of old bulbs if there was a subsidy for it. But he stresses that "the government must set standards, so that -- like with wastewater and gas -- the firms don't dare not handle
it spreads through the atmosphere and is highly mobile. After precipitating out of the atmosphere, it accumulates as methylmercury in fish and can easily end up in the human body via the food chain.
This year Lin Xuyi, a People’s Representative from Zhuhai, submitted a proposal to the National People’s Congress calling for the establishment of recycling mechanisms for energy-saving bulbs. Although the proposal had earlier been presented to the relevant authorities, nothing came of it. but "there’s no way to handle the mercury at the moment; Semi-conductor lights such as LEDs – light-emitting diodes -- are seen as a solution to the problem. They contain no mercury, use 80% less electricity and have a lifespan of eight to 12 years.
Only three of China’s energy-saving bulb manufacturers have recycling equipment，While putting together his proposal, Lin spoke to many manufacturers and industry associations. it".