The Department of Environmental Quality is awarding a $50,000 Community Pollution Prevention (P2) Grant to Urban Options to establish collection sites for home and commercial mercury thermostats.  Many older thermostats contain mercury switches and with the current efforts to improve energy efficiency, it is expected that many thermostats will be removed and replaced with programmable thermostats that will save energy and reduce heating costs.

To support the recycling of the mercury thermostats, this project will establish new sites across the state where thermostats can be recycled for free and help keep mercury out of landfills and incinerators.

As with all community grant recipients, Urban Options will be required to match the state funds by at least 25 percent.  Locations of recycling centers and additional information on this program will be available online at http://www.urbanoptions.org once available.  Information on mercury pollution prevention may be found at http://www.michigan.gov/deqmercuryp2.

Editor's note:  DEQ news releases are available on the department's Internet home page at www.michigan.gov/deq.

"Protecting Michigan's Environment, Ensuring Michigan's Future"