• Customer Services
• Your PUD
• Conservation/Environment
  • Operating Responsibly
  • Fish and Wildlife
  • Habitat Conservation Plans
  • Energy Conservation
  • Water Conservation
  • Solar and Wind (SNAP)
• Learning Center
• Parks and Recreation
• Working At The PUD
• Vendors and Contractors
• En español

SEARCH

Finally, a place to recycle CFLs

National retailer The Home Depot filled a big gap in Chelan County when it announced in June that it would begin recycling compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs).

CFL recycling is available at all 1,973 The Home Depot locations. According to the company, the free service is the first to be made widely available by a retailer in the United States.

Calvin Wheeler, manager of the Wenatchee store at 1405 Maiden Lane, said residents can bring their used CFLs to a receptacle at the store’s returns desk. The lamps are collected and sent to Environmental Services in Seattle for recycling. The company follows all environmental and government guidelines for the disposal and recycling, Wheeler said. The bulbs are broken down into their respective parts of glass, phosphor powder and mercury. He said the glass and mercury are then sold by a third-party company as commodities.

The Home Depot will not accept broken bulbs, Wheeler said. (See EPA guidelines for handling broken CFLs). The company also is not recycling the larger fluorescent tubes used primarily in business and industrial settings.

In addition to the CFL recycling program, The Home Depot also has launched an in-store
energy conservation program to switch light fixture showrooms in stores from incandescent bulbs to CFLs, saving $16 million a year in energy costs.

CFL recycling is part of The Home Depot’s Eco Options program, designed to identify products that have a smaller impact on the environment.

According to the company, 75 percent of households in the U.S. are located within 10 miles of a Home Depot store. In a news release, the company states it is the largest retailer of light bulbs in the country, selling more than 75 million in 2007, which saved Americans approximately $4.8 billion in energy costs and 51.8 billon pounds in CO2 greenhouse gases over the life of the bulbs.

Other environmental measures initiated by The Home Depot include:

• A store recycling program in the U.S. of shrink wrap and mixed plastics, projected to divert 50 million pounds of waste from landfills each year.
• An internal recycling initiative at corporate headquarters designed to increase the amount of recycled materials from 30 percent to at least 65 percent.
• A commitment to use transportation partners registered in the SmartWay program, reducing carbon emissions linked to The Home Depot distribution centers and stores.

More information is available on the The Home Depot Web site.

Related links
ThinkGreenFromHome.com: Waste Management offers recycling by mail