Arctic Mercury Releases Inventory

Arctic Mercury Releases Inventory

Preface

Over the past 10 years, the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP) have conducted assessments documenting the sources, levels, trends, and effects of a wide range of priority pollutants including mercury in the Arctic. The main conclusions of these assessments are that: “In comparison with most other areas of the world, the Arctic remains a clean environment. However, for some pollutants, combinations of different factors give rise to concern in certain ecosystems and for some human populations. These circumstances sometimes occur on a local scale, but in some cases may be regional or circumpolar in extent.”

Mercury is a heavy metal of special concern. It is toxic to human and other living organisms and bioaccumulates in the Arctic marine food chain to reach levels that are a cause for concern especially for that part of the population of Canada and Greenland whose traditional diets include fish and marine mammals.

In response to the AMAP findings, the Arctic Council decided in 2001 to implement a number of projects; among these a project on `Reduction of Atmospheric Mercury Emissions from Arctic States' as part of the 'Arctic Council Action Plan to Eliminate Pollution of the Arctic` (ACAP). The project objective is to contribute to a reduction of mercury releases from the Arctic countries, partly through supporting development of mercury release inventories and release reduction strategies, and partly by initiating actions to demonstrate release reduction options at one, or a few, specific sources located in an Arctic country. The sources are selected based on regional and national release inventories and a detailed evaluation of potential demonstration project sites.

This Arctic Mercury Release Inventory has identified and quantified a number of sources of mercury releases. The sources are from a wide range of categories including intentional use of mercury in chemical industry and product manufacturing, as well as releases from mining and metallurgy, and energy production. Presently identified source categories include: coal fired power plants, waste incineration, chlor-alkali plants, and non-ferrous smelters. The Arctic countries are addressing these releases through a variety of strategies. Domestic initiatives are in place or being developed to meet the countries' objectives and to address international obligations. International agreements related to mercury and of relevance to Arctic countries include the UNECE Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution, OSPAR, HELCOM, the North American Regional Action Plan, regional agreements between USA and Canada, and EU legislation. These agreements cover multiples aspects of mercury (monitoring, emissions inventories, product controls, reduction of releases, etc.), having some aspects in common but also differences.

Mercury specific reduction technologies may have evolved since the agreements were developed and will continue to evolve. The regional release inventory includes a listing of some current options to address mercury releases from the major source categories identified in the inventory. These options are reflected to varying degrees in the countries' existing strategies and in the international agreements. The listing provides Arctic countries with:

possible additional measures that could be considered for achieving further reductions in mercury releases
potential for transfer and sharing of technology and knowledge between among the Arctic countries, and
possibilities leading to introduction and implementation of new technologies and practices as well as possibilities for successful pilot-scale and demonstration projects.

Further, the listing may provide valuable information for countries outside of the Arctic Council region that are seeking to develop national and regional mercury strategies.

This review focused on the technical aspects of the inventory, including verification of the accuracy of reporting of country questionnaires, and options to address mercury releases. The review does not extend to endorsing, from a policy standpoint, any of the specific possible options related to source categories that are identified in the inventory. Therefore the possible options are not prescriptive to the countries but are intended to provide information and indicate possibilities for future consideration.

The ACAP mercury project is co-ordinated by Denmark with COWI A/S as consultant. We would like to thank the members of the ACAP Steering Group and the reviewers contributing to the preparation of this report.

Karsten Skov
Deputy Director
Danish Environmental Protection Agency