Re: [greenyes] recycling of teflon coated metal

[Alan Muller <amuller@no.address>]

At 01:46 PM 9/8/2005 -0500, Reindl, John wrote:
> Does anyone have any guidance (hard facts would be especially useful !) on 
> the potential environmental hazards of recycling teflon coated metal?
>
> I received the below email and don't have any in-depth knowledge on this.
>
> Thanks,
>
> John
>
>
> >
> >I have a bunch of old teflon coated cookware and tins that I want to get 
> rid
> >of.  Any idea about recycling them.  I talked with a scrap aluminum
> >purchaser today and she'd never heard the question.  My son has given me 
> the
> >guilt about giving carcinogenic kitchen utensils to the poor.

Have been looking into this a little because of current controversies over 
Teflon and DuPont.

Harmful emissions from PTFE-coated pans (Teflon is the DuPont brand but is 
not the only source) are documented at over-heated pan temps well below the 
melting point of aluminum.  So one can assume that the melting-down process 
would not be clean.  But scrap Al often has grease, paint, and other 
fume-producing nasties on it.  I doubt that most aluminum-melters are in 
the habit of taking any special precautions for Teflon pans in the mix.

Alan

> >

Alan Muller, Executive Director
Green Delaware
Box 69
Port Penn, DE 19731 USA
(302)834-3466
fax (302)836-3005
greendel@no.address
www.greendel.org