On Sep 15, 9:34*pm, (Don Klipstein) wrote:
In m, David Nebenzahl
wrote:



On 9/14/2008 9:15 PM Don Klipstein spake thus:

In m, David Nebenzahl
wrote:

(I am following up to say which ones are close enough to Not A Problem)

o Lead:
* o Gasoline additive (tetraethyl lead)
* o Solder (per ROHS regs)

* Solder in electronic equipment accounts for little lead in the
environment, and less still as circuit boards are shrunk as
miniaturization progresses.

Not true, considering how much elecronics ends up in landfills. Oh,
yeah, I know, it's *supposed* to be disposed of properly by those who
discard it, but let's get real: how many people do you think actually
take their old TVs, computers, cell phones, answering machines, games,
audio equipment, radios, CD players, remotes, pagers, etc., to a
recycling center or disposal facility? Hell, in my neighborhood, they
just leave that **** out on the street!

* The solder content already accounted for little lead contribution to the
environment, and is greatly shrinking! *I even dare to say that there is
not even 1 gram of lead in a modern cell phone or a modern answering
machine! *I suspect that my cellphone, if it has its solder being the
lead-containing "good stuff", would have close to .2 gram of lead!

Solder with lead is unusual by not having a crystal boundary movement
process prone to growing whiskers. Try web searching for "tin
whiskers" - although that is a problem with any lead-free solder
achieved so far that melts at an appropriate temperature for
soldering electronic components.

I'm aware of those and other problems with lead-free solder. That's
another discussion.

* I find requirements/forcings/encouragements to use lead-free solder (or
else go out of business) to be *very relevant* here!

* Lead-acid batteries, tetraethyl lead for gasoline and lead paint
accounted for close to all lead going into the environment. *Lead-acid
batteries are still around, but most get properly recycled now. *Lead
output into the environment has had a monumental decrease, even in the USA
where it is still legal to make consumer electronic products with solder
that has lead.

* o Drainpipe sealant

* Can you tell me what is inherently wrong with that one?

Oh, I don't know, how about *lead leaching into wastewater*?

* Please tell me how drain sealant has lead!!!

* o CRT X-ray shielding

* My experience with CRT TVs is that those are steel. *Unless you are
talking about within the CRT - in which case the lead is in the form of
leaded glass, and the lead does an extremely excellent job of staying in
the glass, even if the glass is broken into small pieces.

I'm talking about the lead in the tube. Not sure how inert the lead is
inside the glass; I've always heard this particular source of lead
discussed as dangerous.

* Mainly, more like entirely falsely!

(Remember that there is 5-10 lb. of lead in the
average CRT.)

* Can you cite that, especially for a TV that weighs only 30 pounds?

* And *More Importyantly*, how does lead content getting into a few pounds
become an environmental hazard if it is in lead-containing glass? *In
such glass, the lead has an *extremely impressive* rate of staying part of
the glass, even if the glass is broken and even ground into crumbs!!!

o Mercury (in CFLs, batteries, etc.)

* CFLs can actually reduce mercury pollution unless used unwisely - by
reducing mercury emissions from coal fired power plants. *When they last
past about 5,000 hours and replace incandescents of at least 60 watts, on
average they actually do that.

I'm talking about the mercury contained in CFLs themselves. Again, not a
problem (or not as much of a problem) if disposed of properly, but
again, with millions of CFLs in circulation, how many of them are
actually going to be? I've even contributed to the problem by dropping
them on the floor ...

* And I expect that if *you* bought enough CFLs for home usage in my
nation to bust 2 of them, I suspect more likely you have a good chance of
*decreasing* how much mercury I have to inhale or eat by increasing CFL
usage! *Even if your home is only 100 miles upwind of mine!

*0- Don Klipstein )





o Drainpipe sealant

Can you tell me what is inherently wrong with that one?

Oh, I don't know, how about *lead leaching into wastewater*?

Please tell me how drain sealant has lead!!





I believe the OP is referring to the original practice of using lead &
oakum (?) to assemble cast iron drain lines.

Leaching of lead into waste water was probably very minimal but with
waste water from lots of houses draining into a semi-closed body of
water concentrations could build up.

Even copper fresh water plumbing leaches copper into water and over
time contributes to increasing copper levels in San Francisco bay.

cheers
Bob