EVISA News revisited: Dissension on the best way to fight mercury pollution

Mercury is a global pollutant and reaches even areas remote from any direct emission sources such as pristine nature and even the Artic and Antarctic. Coal-fired plants and other human activities release mercury into the environment, where some of it ends up converted into methyl mercury, a potent neurotoxin. Researchers have linked it to learning difficulties and abnormal fetal development in the past.

EVISA reported in April 2005 about a hot debate in the US related to the best way to fight over mercury emission. Since coal-fired power plants produce a significant part of man-made emissions of mercury to the atmosphere, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced in March 2005 the Clean Air Mercury Rule meant to cut mercury emissions from the nations 600 coal-burning power plants by nearly half until 2020.

© US DOE

Also, in order to prevent global environmental pollution and health damage caused by mercury on an international scale, a new convention named "Minamata Convention on Mercury" was agreed in January 2013. The treaty seeks to decrease the discharge of mercury into the air, water and land, to promote proper storage and disposal of mercury, as well as reduce the use and discharge of mercury in the process of gold mining in developing countries.

In a new study published this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, MIT researchers report that global action on reducing mercury emissions will lead to twice the economic benefits for the U.S., compared with domestic action, by 2050. However, those in the U.S. who consume locally caught freshwater fish, rather than seafood from the global market, will benefit more from domestic rather than international mercury regulations.

Overall, while both policies are projected to lead to roughly the same amount of reductions in mercury deposited on U.S. soil compared to a no-policy case, Americans' intake of mercury by 2050 are estimated to be 91 percent lower under the global treaty, compared to 32 percent under U.S. policy alone. The researchers say these numbers reflect the U.S. commercial fish market, 90 percent of which is sourced from Pacific and Atlantic Ocean basins -- regions that are heavily influenced by emissions from non-U.S. sources, including China.

Based on these calculations, the team estimated that by 2050, emissions reductions under the Minamata Convention on Mercury would lead to $339 billion in lifetime benefits and $104 billion in economy-wide benefits in the U.S., compared to $147 billion and $43 billion, respectively, from MATS. The global treaty, then, should lead to more than twice the benefits projected from the domestic policy.

Another study from the US suggests that the benefits of existing pollution controls in the US may be underestimated, since these provide a substantial side benefit. The authors concluded that mercury emission from coal-fired power plants have been reduced as a co-benefit from controls designed to limit sulphur and nitrogen emissions. The reaction that controls nitrogen oxide emissions also oxidizes mercury, while the controls that target sulfur emissions also remove oxidized mercury from the exhaust stream.

The sulfur controls appear to be key to the global trends. China went from having essentially none to having them installed on 86 percent of its coal plants in less than a decade. This meant that mercury emissions probably grew at half the rate of the increase in coal use. Japan more than doubled the plants with these controls over a 15-year period (to 70 percent); Europe's use of the technology increased at a similar pace.

Overall, the authors estimate that emissions of elemental mercury—the form that stays in the atmosphere for long time and therefore spreads globally—has declined by 30 percent over the 20 years ending in 2010. Globally, the emissions of oxidized mercury are up, but only by about nine percent. Since that doesn't spread widely, this increase will primarily impact the countries where coal use has gone up, such as India and China.

And what about Europe ?

According to a study by the Institute for Ecology and Politics (Ökopol) commissioned by the Green Party fraction represented in the German Parliament, Germany is under the top pollutants with respect to mercury emissions in Europe. The study says that coal-fired power plants, which are still responsible for 40 percent of Germany's electricity supply, emit more than 7 tons of mercury each year. The 16 lignite or brown coal plants in Germany are especially bad offenders. Using the state-of-the art technology already in use in the US, "85 percent of mercury emissions could have been prevented",  Christian Tebert, the author of the Ökopol study, wrote. While stricter rules are planned for 2019, Germany's limits would still be more than double those in the US.

 

 

 

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