Dear Kamal,

10 kg of mercury is an important quantity and may cause serious contamination or pollution if no precautions are taken to remove it. Before all operations concerning mercury removal, the room must be hermetically closed and only authorized people (correctly equipped with masks and drysuit) can enter and work to decontamination. In my laboratory, we had the same problem (but with less than 100 g of mercury) and we decided to call an external specialized team that come with all this equipment and worked with a kind of sulfur powder. During this time, the mercury concentration in the atmosphere of the lab and the surroundings rooms was continuously measured in the way to detect any anomaly and to remove people in case of excess standard (more paricularly sensitive people as pregnant  women).

Regards,

Philippe

Dear Mr. Khalil,

the above recommendations by Phillpe Gombert would be the best approach. If, however, a specialized company that could collect the mercury is not available, I would recommend the following interim procedure: 

Transfer the mercury to one or more non-breakable bottles/ flasks (strong PE/PP or carbon steel) with leakproof screw caps. This transfer should be done in a running hood above a tray. If a hood is not available, the procedure could be done outside above a sufficiently large tray wearing a mask with a specialised mercury filter (plus gloves and protective suit).

Each bottle should be labelled and safety warnings attached. The bottles could then be placed in a leak-proof plastic drum. The room between the bottles should stuffed with soft material (e.g. paper, cardboard), so that the bottles don't tumble over and stay upright when the drum is transported. The drum must be labelled as well. It must not be used to store other waste. The drum should be placed in a locked, clearly labeled storage room (e.g. for chemical waste or non combustable hazardous chemicals) that is accessible only to selected trained staff.

More Information may be found in the attached UNDP Guidelines (see link):

Disposal is a separate problem. If in your country there is no disposal facility that accepts elemental mercury the mercury would have to be exported for final disposal somewhere else (probably Europe). Disposal of stabilzed mercury (= mercury sulphide) is generally recommended but so far I cannot recommend any of the documented stabilization procedures for local use in a laboratory. Actually, we are preparing a project to develop a safe and effective stabilization method for small mercury quantities, but it may need some time for implementation. If you are interested in the progress of this project, please contact me.  

Best regards

Sven Hagemann

http://www.undp.org/content/dam/aplaws/publication/en/publications/environment-energy/www-ee-library/chemicals-management/cleanup-storage-and-transport-of-mercury-waste-from-healthcare-facilities/Guidance%20on%20Cleanup%20Storage%20and%20Transport%20of%20Mercury%20from%20Health%20Care%20July%202010.pdf

The best is to sell it to a mercury salts manufacurer!

Dear Colleagues / Philippe Gombert, Sven Hagemann, and Luis Bertello

Thank you very much for your prompt and valuable comprehensive information about the task.

Now, I'm planning to collect the mercury guided by the information offered by Dr. Gombert, and Dr. Hagemann.

Thank you Dr. Hagemann, for supplying the "guidance document":

GUIDANCE ON THE CLEANUP, TEMPORARY OR INTERMEDIATE STORAGE, AND TRANSPORT OF MERCURY WASTE FROM HEALTHCARE FACILITIES

and I recommend it for interested people.

Best Regards

Kamal M.S. Khalil

http://www.undp.org/content/dam/apl...m%20Health%20Care%20July%202010.pdf