The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced its long-awaited standards to limit mercury, lead and other toxic pollutants emitted by power plants. These are the US’s first national standards for mercury and other dangerous emissions from new and existing coal and oil-fired power plants.

The new mercury and air toxics standards (MATS) aims to cut emissions of heavy metals, including mercury, arsenic, chromium and nickel, as well as acid gases such as hydrochloric acid and hydrofluoric acid. The EPA says these toxic air pollutants are linked to cancer and other serious illnesses. 

In announcing MATS, President Obama noted that President George H W Bush signed legislation more than two decades ago requiring US power plants and others to limit the amount of mercury and other toxic gases that they were releasing, but he said that law had never been fully implemented because ‘special interest groups kept delaying the process’.

‘Because we are acting, emissions of mercury and other pollutants, which cause a range of health problems, including neurological damage in children, will decrease significantly,’ he said.

Health savings

The EPA estimates thatthese new standards will prevent up to 11,000 premature deaths, 4700 heart attacks and 130,000 asthma attacks, saving the nation as much as $90 billion (£57 billion) each year. There are roughly 1400 units affected by this action – approximately 1100 existing coal-fired units and 300 oil-fired units. The agency estimates that the annual cost of this rule, which is due to go into effect in mid-February,will be $9.6 billion. Plants will generally have up to four years to comply with MATS.

Obama’s deputy assistant for energy and climate change, Heather Zichal, predicted that some in Congress will try to prevent these standards from being implemented. She said some will argue that these rules will damage power distribution across the US, despite independent analysis from the Department of Energy (DOE) indicating otherwise. ‘Others will claim that there is not enough time to comply with these standards, despite the fact that these rules have been in the works for 20 years,’ Zichal said.

Meanwhile, the ranking Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee vowed to overturn the MATS rules when Congress reconvened in January. Senator Jim Inhofe called the new EPA standards ‘yet another costly rule that will have a devastating effect on jobs and American families,’ warning that MATS will cause electricity prices to ‘skyrocket’.

The head of the Edison Electric Institute (EEI) – an association of shareholder-owned electric companies based in Washington, DC – says that the new regulations are ‘the most expensive’ in the agency’s history. ‘It will require a significant number of electric generating units to design, obtain approval for and install complex controls or replacements in a very short timeframe,’ said EEI’s president, Tom Kuhn. In some cases, it will mean that new transmission and natural gas pipelines will have to be built, he stated.

Link to Full Chemistry World Article

Link to EPA Press Release

The third of five sessions of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC3) will address the release of mercury into the environment from energy production and industrial processes and the use of mercury in small-scale gold mining, consumer goods and its presence in hazardous wastes, among other issues.

Mercury is listed by the World Health Organization (WHO) as one of the top ten chemicals of public health concern. Human exposure to mercury can damage the nervous system and cause behavioural disorders. When released, mercury persists in the environment where it circulates between air, water, sediments and soil. Mercury has toxic effects on humans and wildlife and can enter the food chain through contaminated fish.

To mark the Nairobi negotiations, UNEP hosted a press briefing with senior members of the International Negotiating Committee, including Chairperson Fernando Lugris (Uruguay) and mercury experts from UNEP, WHO and the UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO). Panelists briefed journalists on the implications of a global mercury treaty for Africa.

Much of the discussion focused on artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) and its effects on human health and the environment on the continent.

ASGM remains the largest demand sector for mercury globally, with an estimated 1300 tonnes set to be used in 2011.

ASGM is practiced in around 70 countries, almost half of which are in Africa. Virtually all the mercury used in small scale gold mining is released into the environment, posing long-term risks for mine workers and communities living downstream or downwind from mines.

Abiola Olanipekun, INC Bureau member representing the African regional group, told the press briefing that alternative processes for gold extraction which do not use mercury now exist and that investment in such methods was essential for reducing environmental and health risks.

“When it comes to mercury, Africa is the most vulnerable region”, said Ms. Olanipekun. “Africa needs these alternatives so that the environment and people’s futures aren’t jeopardised. That’s why these negotiations are so important”

Ludovic Bernaudat of the UN Industrial Development Organization told journalists that the high price of gold (currently over US$1700 per ounce) is sparking a ‘gold rush’ in many countries, posing a timely challenge of how to reduce the use of mercury in the growing, but largely informal small-scale mining sector.

Under its Global Mercury Partnership, which brings together governments, civil society and the private sector, UNEP is assisting African countries in developing national mercury inventories. As well as forming the basis of mercury reduction targets, developing comparable sets of data from different countries can serve to enhance international co-operation on mercury. Inventory projects led by the Global Mercury Partnership are currently being explored in Burkina Faso, Senegal and Mali, for example.

As mercury is present as a contaminant in virtually all fossil fuels, reducing emissions of mercury from coal-fired power stations and the burning of oil and gas is also a priority for many countries at the INC negotiations. Other key issues include the presence of mercury in cosmetics, such as skin lightening creams, medical instruments such as thermometers, or mercury-containing hazardous wastes such as batteries and fluorescent lamps.

The INC negotiations, for which UNEP provides the Secretariat, are at the half-way stage in Nairobi, with the aim of achieving a global treaty on mercury by 2013.

Speaking at the opening ceremony of the Nairobi session, UN Under-Secretary-General and UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner said: “It is our obligation through this treaty to create the conditions by which the world will rapidly reduce the likelihood of exposure (to mercury) in both a health and environmental context”.

“The key at the end of 2013 must be that we have a treaty that sets the world on a course where mercury is less likely to affect the lives of people on this planet”, added Mr. Steiner.

Among the key objectives for the INC negotiations are:

• Reducing the supply of mercury onto the market and enhancing capacity for environmentally-sound storage of mercury
• Reducing mercury demand for products, processes and international trade
• Reducing atmospheric emission of mercury
• Addressing mercury-containing waste and remediation of contaminated sites
• Increasing knowledge and capacity building on mercury
• Arrangements for technical and financial assistance to support implementation

There are important development and economic factors to be considered. Artisanal and small-scale gold-mining, for example, contributes an estimated US$10 billion to the global economy and employs around 10-15 million people.

However, low-mercury and mercury-free solutions are available for gold mining (such as gravity separation or concentration methods) which can reduce health and environment risks while avoiding impact on livelihoods.

UNEP INC3 Website

Summary of INC3 outcomes

UNEP Global Mercury Partnership

Bacterial genome may hold answers to mercury mystery

Feathers tell century-plus tale of mercury pollution

Study claims mercury from eating fish not linked to heart disease‎

EPA Proposes First National Standard for Mercury Pollution from Power Plants

In response to a court deadline, today the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed the first-ever national standards for mercury, arsenic and other toxic air pollution from power plants. The updated standards will ensure that all power plants across the country play by the same rules, and provide more certainty to business.  The proposed rule provides up to 4 years for facilities to meet the standards and, once fully implemented, will prevent 91 percent of mercury in coal from being released to the air.

EPA estimates that for every dollar spent to reduce pollution from power plants, the American public and American businesses will see up to $13 in health and economic benefits. The total health and economic benefits of this standard are estimated to be as much as $140 billion annually.

The public comment period, which will last sixty days from posting to the Federal Register, will allow stakeholders including the public, industry and public health communities, to provide input and feedback, ensuring that any final standard maximizes public health benefits while minimizing costs. As part of the public comment process, EPA will also hold public hearings on this proposed rule. Additional details on these events will be announced at a future date.

Full press release

Bacterial genome may hold answers to mercury mystery

A newly sequenced bacterial genome from a team led by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory could contain clues as to how microorganisms produce a highly toxic form of mercury.

Methylmercury, a potent human neurotoxin, appears in the environment when certain naturally occurring bacteria transform inorganic mercury into its more toxic cousin. Few bacterial species are capable of this conversion, and exactly how the transformation takes place has been a matter of debate for decades.

“What is not known are the genes or the proteins that allow these bacteria to mediate the transformation,” said ORNL’s Steven Brown, who led a research team to sequence the genome of a bacterium in the Desulfovibrio genus that is capable of methylating mercury.

A new genome, sequenced at the California-based DOE Joint Genome Institute (JGI) and published in the Journal of Bacteriology, lays the foundation for future research to examine the little understood mechanisms behind the production of methylmercury.

“Mercury is a global contaminant of concern,” Brown said. “We hope that some of the lessons we learn from these studies will be applicable to many sites. If we can identify the genes involved in mercury methylation, we hope to go to the local environment and understand more about the function and the ecology of the organisms and their gene products that mediate this transformation.”

Press Release

Genome Sequence of the Mercury-Methylating Strain Desulfovibrio desulfuricans, The Journal of Bacteriology, April 2011, doi:10.1128/JB.00170-11

Feathers tell century-plus tale of mercury pollution

Albatross feathers from museum specimens have allowed scientists to construct a record of mercury pollution dating back more than 100 years.  The feathers, from the black-footed albatross, contain traces of mercury that the birds picked up when they fed.

The species is endangered; and although fishing is the main cause, the team suggests mercury levels may have been high enough to impair breeding.

The study is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

There was no trend in overall mercury concentrations over the 120 year period studied. But the level of methylmercury – a toxic form of the metal, formed often by bacteria, did show a rise.

BBC News Article April 11 2011

PNAS paper: Temporal increase in organic mercury in an endangered pelagic seabird assessed by century-old museum specimens

Study claims mercury from eating fish not linked to heart disease

A new study suggests mercury exposure from eating fish, linked in some previous research to a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, does not appear to boost heart disease risk.  “We didn’t see any evidence that higher levels of mercury were linked to higher cardiovascular harm,” says researcher Dariush Mozaffarian, MD, DrPH, an associate professor of medicine and epidemiology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston.

”At exposure levels commonly seen in the U.S., we didn’t see any evidence of harm,” he tells WebMD. Mozaffarian cautions that his study, which followed nearly 7,000 men and women, was in adults only and that caveats about limiting intake of high-mercury fish still hold for pregnant women, nursing mothers, and children.

However, the new research is good news for others who eat seafood in moderation, another expert says. “It’s reassuring that mercury [from fish] does not appear to be a major cause of cardiovascular disease, based on this major study,” says Gina Solomon, MD, senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council. The environmental action group has studied mercury in fish and posts a guide on its web site detailing how to eat fish more safely.

Web MD March 2011

Mercury Exposure and Risk of Cardiovascular Disease in Two U.S. Cohorts, New England Journal of Medicine, 2011

The meeting concluded that:

• the presence of mercury in the environment still remains of global concern;
• there is a need to reduce risks to human health and the environment from mercury;
• dealing with major emissions of mercury from industry, in particular from coal combustion for power generation, the phasing out of mercury use in  products, encouraging small-scale gold miners to end the use of mercury amalgamation, and the management of mercury waste and contaminated sites remains a challenge;
• there is need to continue to allow mercury to be used in products and processes subject to exemptions, and such mercury needs to be clearly defined to distinguish it from mercury waste;
• the disposal of mercury is particularly difficult; and
• although coal combustion is the largest source of mercury emissions to air some Nations noted during the negotiations the importance of any controls not restricting their economic development and indicating their unwillingness to consider binding mercury reduction targets.

The INC2 meeting ended with the committee setting a mandate for UNEP to develop a draft text of the comprehensive and suitable approach to mercury for consideration at INC3 to be held in Africa in October 2011.

Full text of Press release available at UNEP website.

In the afternoon delegates heard brief oral reports of informal consultations on: the preamble (Article 3); primary mining (Article 3); products, processes and transitional measures (Articles 7, 8 and 14); financial resources and technical and implementation assistance (Articles 15, 16 ans 17); and awareness-raising, research and monitoring and communication of information (Articles 18 and 19).

Delegates then considered the draft report (UNEP(DTIE)/Hg/INC.2/L.1, Add.1 and Add.2) and it was adopted following numerous textual amendments. Chair Lugris gavelled the meeting to a close at 6:17pm.

A summary and analysis of INC2 will be available on this page on Monday, 31 January 2011.

In the afternoon delegates then turned their attention to financial resources and technical and implementation assistance: Article 15, financial resources and mechanisms; Article 16, technical assistance; and Article 17, implementation committee. Delegates then considered awareness-raising, research and monitoring and communication of information, focusing on: Article 18, information exchange, Article 19, public information, awareness and education; Article 20, research development and monitoring; Article 21, implementation plans; Article 22, reporting; and Article 23, effectiveness evaluation.

Delegates continued discussion on the elements paper (UNEP(DTIE)/Hg/INC.2/3) beginning with Article 5, on international trade with parties in mercury or mercury compounds and Article 6, and on international trade with non-parties in mercury or mercury compounds. Delegates then considered measures to reduce intentional use of mercury, discussing Article 7, mercury-added products, Article 8, manufacturing processes in which mercury is used, and Article 14, allowable-use exemptions, as a cluster of interlinked issues.
In the late afternoon delegates turned their attention to measures to reduce releases of mercury to air, water and land: Article 10, atmospheric emissions; and Article 11, releases to water and land.