If you have old mercury thermometers or thermostats hanging around your house and you’re not sure what to do with them, you have several options.

1) Drop them off at OCRRA’s Rock Cut Road Transfer Station during regular hours of operation.

Covanta Energy is donating $5 Home Depot gift cards to residents who bring mercury thermometers and / or mercury thermostats to Rock Cut Road.*

Mismanaged mercury can be toxic and under certain circumstances can have highly detrimental effects on the nervous system. Removing mercury thermometers from the trash or the sanitary sewers is of considerable benefit to the environment.

As an added bonus for keeping harmful mercury objects from the waste stream, OCRRA sends Onondaga County residents a mercury-free thermometer after they drop-off their old thermometer. (Upon drop-off, residents fill out a card with their name and address and OCRRA mails them a new mercury-free thermometer!)

The thermometer exchange program is made possible through a partnership between OCRRA, the Onondaga County Department of Water Environment Protection and Covanta Energy. A portion of the program cost is also underwritten by a grant from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

* One gift card per resident drop-off, regardless of number of items turned in.

2) Drop them off along with other household hazardous waste at one of OCRRA's Household Hazardous Waste events.

3) Click here for a list of other locations that accept THERMOSTATS from the community.