San Bruno Residents Can Trade Old Mercury Thermometers
for New NexTemp Personal, Reusable, Oral Thermometer 
San Bruno residents can bring mercury fever thermometers to the Engineering Department at City Hall and exchange them for a NexTemp personal, reusable, oral thermometer, free of charge. Hours are 8 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday
This thermometer exchange is intended both to remove mercury from the municipal waste stream and to educate San Bruno residents about the potential hazards posed by mercury found in thermometers and many other common household products.
The San Bruno mercury thermometer exchange is sponsored in part by the San Mateo County Stormwater Pollution Prevention Program.
Exposure to mercury may cause a variety of health effects in people, and children and developing fetuses are particularly sensitive to its hazards. Depending on the level of exposure, mercury can cause damage to the nervous system, the brain, the kidneys, the liver and the immune system.
In San Mateo and elsewhere around the country, mercury is released to the environment in a verity of ways. Many common household products – such as thermostats, fluorescent light bulbs, switches and button batteries – contain mercury. When these products are incinerated, land filled or broken, the mercury can pollute the environment. All of these products can – and should – be disposed of properly at household hazardous waste collections or by calling a licensed hazardous waste disposal company.
But unfortunately, many mercury-containing products currently are tossed out with the household trash and end up in incinerators or landfills. Unlike many other pollutants, mercury does not degrade into something harmless once it mixes with the air or water. In fact, mercury persists in the environment for long periods of time, and bioaccumulates in animals and humans, meaning its concentrations and harmful effects only increase as it moves up the food chain. For this reason, fish consumption advisories are posted by the state Department of Public Health when tests show that fish in a particular lake, pond or river are contaminated with mercury and may be unsafe to eat.
For example, It is especially notable that the mercury employed in gold mining in the Sierra Nevada was refined liquid quicksilver or elemental mercury; this is a form of mercury much more likely to foster net methylation than is cinnabar, the form of mercury in most mercury mines. Approximately 10,000 tonnes of refined mercury were lost to the watershed during the Gold Rush mining era. Much of the mercury consumed by gold mining could have been incorporated into the 12 billion cubic meters of sediments extracted by the mining activities and released to the rivers of the Bay-Delta watershed.
The mercury-laced hydraulic mining debris was ultimately transported to the bay-delta; it is known that large deposits of hydraulic mining debris remain in bay sediments. These wastes formed marshes, islands, or filled or diked marsh, or were deposited in shallow waters. Under the right circumstances this mercury contamination is transported through the food chain and concentrated in some commercial and sport fish. Human consumption of fish caught in the Bay is already restricted because of mercury contamination. Specifically, adults are advised to limit consumption of sport fish from the Bay to two times a month; pregnant or nursing women and children 6 or under should limit consumption to one time a month. Large shark and striped bass from the Bay should not be consumed at all.
For more information about the San Bruno mercury thermometer exchange or to schedule an exchange, contact us at (650) 616-7065 or email us.
For more information about the health and environmental issues posed by mercury in the environment, contact Karen Thomas at NEWMOA at 617-367-8558 ext. 304.
