Can you recycle light bulbs?
Usually no
No bulb belongs in the recycling cart. Which route it does take depends entirely on the type: fluorescents and CFLs carry mercury and have a real collection system behind them, while incandescents and LEDs are trash in the programs we checked. Box or wrap them either way.
Follow it down the line
Three different questions hide inside "is this recyclable?", and the answer can change at each step.
The material · Sometimes
Is the material recyclable?
Three different objects share one word, and they are not close relatives. Fluorescent lamps, including CFLs and tubes, contain mercury, which is why federal rules do not treat them as ordinary rubbish at all: lamps are one of five categories of universal waste, alongside batteries, pesticides, mercury-containing equipment and aerosol cans, a streamlined regime whose stated purpose is to promote collection and recycling and to keep this material out of municipal landfills. Incandescent and halogen bulbs are the opposite case, with nothing much in them worth recovering and nothing much to fear either. LEDs are a third thing again, a small electronic assembly with driver circuitry and, in the lamps of that era, a substantial aluminum heat sink. The Department of Energy took bulbs apart in 2013 and chemically tested them against hazardous waste thresholds, and the result is more interesting than either side of the usual argument: the models tested came in below the federally regulated limits, while nearly all of them, regardless of technology, exceeded at least one stricter California restriction, typically for copper, zinc, antimony or nickel. Any single answer covering all three bulb types is wrong about at least two of them.
Sources: US EPA: universal waste, US DOE Building Technologies Office: life-cycle assessment of energy and environmental impacts of LED lighting products
The facility · No
Will a sorting facility recover it?
A bulb entering a sorting line is not a recoverable item, it is a breakage event. That is true of the harmless ones and much more consequential for the mercury-bearing ones. EPA's argument for lamp recycling turns on exactly this: fluorescent bulbs often break when thrown into a dumpster, trash can or compactor, or when they reach a landfill or incinerator, and recycling is what prevents the mercury being released, while also recovering the glass, the metals and the other materials in the lamp. The point generalizes to a cart, which is a compactor with a longer route. Six states, California, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont and Washington, prohibit mercury-containing lamps from landfills outright. There is a second reason no facility wants any of them, which has nothing to do with mercury and applies to every bulb ever made: bulb glass is not container glass. Cuyahoga County's list of glass that must stay out of the recycling cart names light bulbs alongside ceramics, ovenware, mirrors and crystal, for the same underlying reason. The container glass stream is a narrow specification and a bulb sits outside it.
Sources: US EPA: recycling and disposal of CFLs and other bulbs that contain mercury, CuyahogaRecycles: glass bottles and jars
Your curbside program · Never
Will your curbside program take it?
No program puts bulbs in the recycling cart, so the useful question is which of the other routes applies, and one county answers it three different ways depending on the bulb. Napa sends incandescent bulbs to the landfill cart, noting they are non-toxic. It sends LED bulbs to the landfill cart too. But household fluorescent bulbs and tubes get a free scheduled pickup, on the condition that they go out in a box rather than loose, with tubes up to four feet collected at the curb and anything longer taken to the hazardous waste facility, plus hardware-store drop-off points for those who would rather not wait. San Jose reaches the same place for incandescents by a different road, and adds the detail worth copying: the materials are non-toxic so the garbage is fine, but although the bulb is made of glass, do not recycle it with glass, and wrap it in newspaper and tape it first, because broken glass injures the person handling the bag.
Sources: Napa Recycling: light bulbs, fluorescent or CFL, Napa Recycling: light bulbs, incandescent, Napa Recycling: light bulbs, LED, San Jose Recycles: light bulbs
What you need to do
- Identify the type before anything else. It is the only thing that decides the route
- Never put a bulb of any kind in the recycling cart
- Box fluorescent tubes rather than setting them out loose, which is what the collection programs require
- Wrap and tape incandescent bulbs before binning them, so they do not break on whoever lifts the bag
Where else it can go
Retail take-back
Hardware and battery chains collect bulbs, and it is often the fastest route for a household with one dead CFL. Napa lists local hardware stores as drop-off points; San Jose points at a battery and bulb chain that takes even incandescents.
A fee sometimes applies, and what each store accepts differs. Worth a phone call before a drive.
Household hazardous waste
The route that takes what nothing else will, including fluorescent tubes longer than four feet and anything from a business rather than a home.
Business-generated bulbs are often handled differently from household ones, sometimes by appointment only.
The trash, wrapped
For incandescent and halogen bulbs this is the honest answer, and both programs cited here give it. Wrap and tape the bulb first so it does not break in the bag.
Not for fluorescents or CFLs, and outright prohibited for mercury lamps in six states.
Common mistakes
- Recycling a bulb because it is glass. Bulb glass is not container glass, and one program on this page says so in as many words
- Binning a CFL or tube in one of the six states that prohibit mercury lamps from landfills
- Assuming LEDs must be recyclable because they are the efficient choice. Both programs here send them to landfill
- Setting fluorescent tubes out loose, where they break and release the exact thing the collection exists to contain
- Looking for one answer that covers all bulbs. The county cited here publishes three different ones