when the lights go out

Search out any list of "ways to help the environment" and I guarantee you'll find the admonition to replace your incandescent bulbs with fluorescent ones. They use something like a quarter of the electricity and as a bonus, last much longer than traditional bulbs, saving you some $$ on top of feeling good about being "green."
What's not to love?

We started that process a while ago. Long enough, actually, to have some of our fluorescent bulbs go out. And now all the helpful voices have become very quiet, and I am getting very little help in finding the right way to dispose of these things. Fluorescent bulbs contain a small amount of mercury - not enough that I'm worried about my home, but enough that if we all tossed used bulbs out with the garbage and let them break and release mercury into dumps, we'd end up contaminating our water supplies first and then watch as the mercury made its way on up the food chain. Not ideal.

So after quite a bit of googling I'm positive only that "recycle" is the proper method of disposal. The problem is that not many sites go into more detail than that.

I did, however, find this very nifty earth 911 site where you use your zip code and the type of item you would like to dispose of to find the nearest options for recycling. It looks like the nearest site for fluorescent bulbs recycling is 57 miles away from me, clear in another state. Dag-NABit Jim-Bob. I'm set for motor oil and computer recycling though, with places showing up as close as 0.0 miles from me.

Seriously, if we're going to encourage conservation, we've really got to do it intelligently. While I've found a very large number of announcements for programs giving away fluorescent bulbs and encouraging their use, I've not seen much movement afoot to take care of their disposal. Seems more than a bit shortsighted to me. We can't just jump on the bandwagon de jour and stop thinking. Life is complicated. Taking care of our planet is complicated. But both are worth the effort.

Edited to note that I was recently pointed to a website for reasonably-priced mail-in recycling for these bulbs.