RWS Launches Extensive Mercury Collection Program

Effort to encourage residents to throw away mercury products safely vs. in their trash

PORTLAND, Maine - As part of an ongoing, comprehensive effort to reduce the amount of mercury that enters the waste stream, Regional Waste Systems, Inc. has announced a series of free mercury product collections to be held in six southern Maine communities this summer and fall.

Mercury is a toxic element that can affect the environment and human health when it enters the waste stream when people throw away products containing mercury in their trash. Residents of the 27 cities and towns served by RWS, a non-profit municipal-owned organization, will have the opportunity to properly dispose of common household items that may contain mercury, such as mercury thermometers, button cell batteries, fluorescent lamps, non-electronic thermostats, electrical switches and relays, and medical devices such as blood pressure cuffs.

The campaign kicks off with a mercury collection scheduled for Windham on Saturday, July 28. The remaining mercury collections will be held on Saturdays in the following communities: Waterboro, August 4; Bridgton, August 11; Scarborough, August 18; Yarmouth, September 15; and Portland, September 22. Residents in any RWS community can drop off material at any of the collections, although RWS recommends attending the collection nearest the town in which you live.

To encourage the use of mercury-free products, RWS will give away free digital thermometers to the first 75 residents who turn in a mercury thermometer at each the six events. A complete schedule of events with locations will be posted at http://regionalwaste.org at the end of June.

The collection will be handled for RWS by Clean Harbors of South Portland, which will recycle or properly dispose of the mercury as a hazardous material.

This isn't the first time the non-profit, municipal organization organized a community effort to reduce toxins from being thrown away in the trash before they receive it and it enters the waste stream. In 1999, RWS conducted an extensive HHW (household hazardous waste) collection program with collections held in 31 cities and towns that are part of RWS.

Residents in the communities that make up RWS can drive to designated collection sites, usually the town's transfer station, where collection workers will meet them and remove the material from their vehicles. Organizers would like the items containing mercury to be placed in cardboard boxes, if possible.

The municpalities that are presently part of the RWS cooperative and invited to attend a collection are: Baldwin, Bridgton, Cape Elizabeth, Casco, Cumberland, Falmouth, Freeport, Gorham, Gray, Harrison, Hiram, Hollis, Limington, Lyman, Naples, North Yarmouth, Ogunquit, Parsonsfield, Porter, Portland, Pownal, Scarborough, South Portland, Standish, Waterboro, Windham, and Yarmouth.

Organizers tout the program as the most effective way to collect and dispose of items with mercury while giving residents the opportunity to take an active part in reducing mercury release into the environment.

"It's important that we do all that we can to reduce the amount of mercury that gets into the waste stream," said Mark Arienti, environmental manager at RWS since 1998. "When disposed of improperly, this material can adversely impact human health and the environment. This program allows residents in our member communities to rid their homes of common items containing mercury in an environmentally safe and convenient way."

RWS also last fall installed new carbon equipment that has reduced by 85 percent the mercury emissions from items incinerated after being disposed of in the trash. Buoyed by the new equipment, the mercury-reduction efforts to date at RWS have enabled it to meet state and federal guidelines for mercury emissions, RWS officials said. The mercury collection program will enable RWS to even further reduce those emissions.

Mercury is emitted from waste-to-energy plants when products containing mercury are thrown away in the trash and enter the waste stream. It is not a byproduct of the burning process, but rather the result of products such as fever thermometers and fluorescent lamps in the solid waste stream. Last fall, RWS teamed up with the Portland Water District to hold a mercury thermometer exchange program where 300 digital thermometers were given to area residents who turned in mercury thermometers.

RWS is a non-profit solid waste management corporation that is owned and controlled by 21 cities and towns, and also has six associate member towns. RWS is also the largest municipal recycling organization in the state. Established in 1974 after Portland, South Portland, Cape Elizabeth and Scarborough decided to form a cooperative to handle their waste disposal, today RWS is governed by a 28-member board, consisting of officials appointed from member towns. RWS accepts solid waste and recycled materials from these communities and also has a comprehensive, state-of-the-art recycling program with more than 100 recycling bins in 60 locations. For additional information on RWS, visit the RWS web site, http://www.regionalwaste.org.

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