LIKE
Thursday March 28, 2024


Click the logos
for news and info
about these companies

Non-Profits & Special Events








Products & Services










Banking & Finance




Construction &
Real Estate






Travel & Tourism








Public Affairs











Top Headlines

For Immediate Release
August 10, 2001

Contact:
E-mail: beryl@wolfenews.com

Beryl Wolfe
(207) 775-5115

Web Site: http://www.regionalwaste.org

RWS to Hold Free Mercury Product Collection in Scarborough August 18

Thermometers, fluorescent light bulbs, button cell batteries among items to be collected to keep mercury out of waste stream

SCARBOROUGH - Residents of Scarborough and surrounding communities that are served by Regional Waste Systems, Inc. can dispose of products containing mercury at a collection day to be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, August 18, at the Scarborough Public Works facility at 20 Washington Ave., located off Route 1 in the Scarborough Industrial Park.

RWS is sponsoring the mercury product collection as part of an ongoing, comprehensive effort to reduce the amount of mercury that enters the environment. The collection in Scarborough is among a series of collection days in six southern Maine communities this summer and fall to serve all 27 towns that are part of RWS.

The collection is for mercury products only. Other hazardous household waste, such as paint cans, will not be accepted. Residents are asked to place their products containing mercury in a cardboard box and bring it to the collection site. The collection, a free service, will be set up as a drive-thru to make it easier to participate. For more information, contact Mark Arienti of RWS at 773-6465. Also, 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.

Mercury is a toxic element that can affect the environment and human health. Besides mercury thermometers, common household products that may contain mercury include fluorescent lamps, button cell batteries, non-digital thermostats, certain electrical switches and relays, and certain medical devices such as non-digital blood pressure cuffs. These items should not be disposed of with other trash.

The Scarborough collection is open to residents in any of the 27 towns and cities served by RWS, a non-profit municipal-owned organization. But RWS recommends attending the collection nearest the town in which you live.

The remaining mercury collections will be held on Saturdays in the following communities: Yarmouth, September 15 and Portland, September 22. A complete schedule of events with locations is posted at http://www.regionalwaste.org or at http://www.wolfenews.com.

The cities and towns served by RWS 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.

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

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. "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 new 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. RWS gave out 300 digital thermometers to area residents who turned in those containing mercury.

Regional Waste Systems, Inc. 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 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.

# # #


NOTE: Wolfe News Wire is an online source for news and information about noteworthy companies and organizations. We invite you to share this content and/or leave a comment. Background info and past news items from a specific organization can be found by clicking the side logos. For more info, please email info@wolfenews.com. Thank you!



Terms of Use and Privacy Policy




©2015 Wolfe Public Relations. All Rights Reserved.