PORTLAND – Mainers are finding it easier to get rid of old thermometers, burned-out fluorescent lamps and other items that contain mercury.

Maine legislators five years ago passed a law banning the disposal of mercury-containing products in the regular household trash. Since then, the state has awarded $750,000 in grants to local communities to help them purchase storage sheds for the waste so they will be ready when the law goes into effect on Jan. 1.

By the end of last year, nearly half the state’s population, or 550,000 Mainers, had access to mercury collection and recycling programs, according to the State Planning Office. More programs have come on line this year, so the number is probably higher now, according to Sam Morris of the state’s recycling and waste management program.

“We still have work to do,” Morris said. “I would say we’re encouraged that we’re at that point, but still that means some towns have to figure out what they’re going to do come January 1.”

Towns aren’t required to send their next recycling reports to the state until early 2005, so officials won’t know until then exactly how many communities made the deadline.

When mercury, a neurotoxin, is tossed into the trash, it can end up in a landfill or incinerator, where it is burned and gets into the air. From there, it falls into lakes, rivers and other bodies of water, where it accumulates in fish and wildlife.

Household products are considered unnecessary contributors to the problem because there are so many mercury-free alternatives available now. Included in the ban are fluorescent lights, compact fluorescent lights, thermostats, thermometers, blood pressure cuffs, wall barometers, mercury switches used in pumps, and flame sensors from old gas stoves.

Ann Pistell of the Maine DEP said some towns have set up mercury collection facilities at their transfer stations or recycling centers. Others have contracted out the work. Consumers should call ahead to see what products their towns will accept and where they should be taken.

Most towns are already collecting fluorescent lamps and compact fluorescent lamps, as well as thermometers and other smaller items, Pistell said. Some towns may charge a fee for collecting the waste, others may not.

Pistell said if people have jars of elemental mercury at home, they should call the DEP and someone will pick it up, because it is not included in the new law.

Although that sounds like an unusual situation, she said the DEP gets at least one such call every week.

“I’d say probably 70 percent of the calls are ‘My dad died, I’m cleaning out his house and his barn, and I found it.’ Well, Dad had it for various and sundry reasons,” Pistell said.

“He may have been an amateur chemist. He may have cleaned his guns with it. He may have been a farmer and added a little mercury to a little pesticide, and it was real lethal against those bugs. There’s all sorts of weird reasons why people had mercury.”