Great Lakes Binational Toxics Strategy
Mercury

MEMORANDUM

The Binational Toxics Strategy sets the following mercury reduction challenge for the United States:

"Seek by 2006, a 50 percent reduction nationally in the deliberate use of mercury and a 50 percent reduction in the release of mercury from sources resulting from human activity. The release challenge will apply to the aggregate of releases to the air nationwide and of releases to the water within the Great Lakes Basin. This challenge is considered an interim reduction target and, in consultation with stakeholders, will be revised if warranted, following completion of the Mercury Study Report to Congress."

The purpose of this memo is to provide an update on the status of progress toward meeting the 50 percent use reduction challenge. Data relevant to assessing progress on the mercury release challenge should become available this summer.

Data sources and issues: The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) provided mercury consumption data through 1997.⁽¹⁾ Unfortunately, USGS did not report any consumption data for 1998 or 1999, because of lack of sufficient responses to the USGS voluntary survey on mercury sales. However, Bruce Lawrence of Bethlehem Apparatus, the leading dealer of mercury in the United States, has developed estimates of 1999 mercury demand. These estimates, using the same categories as previously reported by USGS, were presented to a recent workshop.⁽²⁾ The estimates are derived from Bethlehem Apparatus's figures on its own sales of mercury, combined with knowledge and assumptions about sales by Bethlehem's competitors. Thus, all figures in the table below from years prior to 1997 are from USGS data, while 1999 figures are from Bruce Lawrence, with the exception of the fluorescent lamp category. In the case of fluorescent lamps, mercury use for 1999 was assumed to be the same as 1997, for reasons discussed below.

While this information is the best currently available, caution should be used in interpreting trends, since estimates of mercury use in different years come from different sources. The data seem to indicate that after considerable success in reducing mercury use through 1997, progress has stalled. This interpretation may be an accurate reflection of reality, but it is perhaps more likely that the apparent lack of recent progress is in part an artifact of different estimating techniques used for different years.  According to Bruce Lawrence, some mercury dealers did not report their sales of mercury to the USGS in the mid-1990s, so that USGS figures for these years underestimate mercury consumption. The figures for 1999, however, include Bruce Lawrence's estimate of purchases from all mercury dealers.⁽³⁾  Moreover, USGS, while not reporting any new data on consumption since 1997, has estimated that "consumption continued to decline in 1999."

Mercury use trends: The baseline for the mercury use challenge is the most recent mercury use inventory at the time the Binational Toxics Strategy was signed--the USGS estimate of mercury consumption in 1995. The table above shows the 1995 baseline, totaling 478 tons, estimated demand for 1996, 1997, 1999, and the 2006 challenge of 239 tons. Estimated mercury demand in 1999 was 346 tons, essentially unchanged from 1997 and an estimated 18 percent decrease below the 1995 baseline. Mercury use has been declining over the longer term as well; estimated 1999 demand represents an 83 percent decrease since 1980.

These figures indicate significant reductions in mercury purchases by for chlorine and caustic soda manufacture by the chlor-alkali sector, perhaps as the result of this industry's efforts under its voluntary commitment to reduce mercury use 50 percent by 2005, from a baseline of average annual use from 1990 through 1995. The Chlorine Institute's May 3, 2000 Third Annual Report to EPA reports mercury purchases of 107 tons in 1999, roughly equivalent to the 95 tons estimated by Bruce Lawrence. This report also provides data mercury use-88 tons in 1999--defined to exclude quantifiable changes in mercury inventory (and therefore to include only mercury added to the production process to make up losses). Mercury use has been declining steadily; 1999 use is 45 percent below 1990-1995 levels. From 1997 through 1999, the Chlorine Institute figures show that the chlor-alkali industry has purchased 129 tons more mercury than it has used, indicating that mercury inventories at chlor-alkali plants are growing.

The category "wiring devices and switches" increased significantly in 1999, becoming the largest category of mercury use at 110 tons, surpassing chlorine production, according to the available figures. However, much of this apparent growth may reflect underestimate of use in this category in earlier years. The largest single use of mercury in this category is for mercury relays, increased use of which has been associated with growing production of capital equipment in the strong economy of the second half of the 1990s, according to Lawrence. Other products in this category include thermostats, float switches, and light switches. While other categories of mercury use have all decreased over the last two decades, mercury use in the "wiring devices and switches" category is almost as high as it was in 1980 (117 tons) and higher than it was in 1990 (77 tons). Some reduction efforts are taking place in this sector, including the gradual phase-out of mercury switches for convenience lighting in automobiles, already completed by Daimler-Chrysler and expected to be completed by Ford and General Motors with the 2002 model year. Use of mercury thermostats may be decreasing as well, given the increased availability and attractiveness of electronic alternatives; moreover, the thermostat manufacturers have developed a collection program to keep thermostats out of solid wastes at the end of their lives. However, little use reduction effort has been devoted to the most significant use of mercury in this category-mercury relays.

Mercury use for "measuring and control instruments," which include gas stove regulators, thermometers, barometers, and sphygmomanometers remained essentially stable from 1997 through 1999, having decreased significantly prior to 1997. Mercury reduction efforts in this area include numerous use reduction and waste management efforts in the medical sector. Mercury use for "dental equipment and supplies" appears to have increased, according to available data.

Mercury use by the lamp industry was assumed to remain at the 1996/1997 level of 32 tons; Lawrence estimated that mercury use by this industry was 46 tons in 1999; however, this estimate incorporates mercury use in lamp production in both Canada and the United States, which is not comparable to the USGS figures for U.S. production only. The National Electric Manufacturer's Association estimates that 13 tons of mercury were inserted into lamps in 1999, down from 27 tons in 1990.⁽⁵⁾ However, lamp manufacturers use additional mercury in the manufacturing process that does not go into the product, but which gets contaminated and sent to a retorter and must be replaced. The lamp industry is doing additional research to quantify the total mass balance of mercury purchased, placed into lamps, used in the production process, and recycled.⁽⁶⁾ No equally energy-efficient alternative to mercury in lamps is currently available, but lamp manufacturers have successfully reduced the amount of mercury needed per lamp; lamp recycling efforts are increasing, particularly with inclusion of lamps in the Universal Waste Rule.

Mercury use in the "other" category has increased since 1997, according to Lawrence's figures, although it has remained below the 1995 - 1996 level. This category includes use of mercury in laboratory instruments, chemicals and batteries. Battery production was the largest use of mercury prior to the phase out of mercury use in alkaline batteries beginning in the late 1980s.

USGS has given a somewhat different account of mercury use by sector.  The 1999 Minerals Yearbook indicates that chorine and caustic soda production accounted for half of mercury consumption, while electrical applications accounted for approximately one-quarter of consumption.  According to USGS, mercury use is decreasing across all categories, except dental uses, in which use is holding steady.

Notes

1. This estimate is contained in the 1997 Minerals Yearbook, available along with other information about mercury on the USGS website at http://minerals.er.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/mercury/ .

2. Bruce Lawrence, "Sources, Demand, Price and the Impacts of Environmental Regulations," Paper Presented at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Research and Development's Workshop on Mercury in Products, Processes, Waste, and the Environment: Eliminating, Reducing and Managing Risks for Non-Combustion Sources, Baltimore, March 22, 2000.

3. Conversation with Bruce Lawrence, May 4, 2000.

4. USGS reported mercury "consumption," defined as "the input of refined liquid mercury to domestic manufacturing establishments." Bruce Lawrence reported U.S. mercury "demand." All figures are short tons, converted from the metric tons reported by USGS and the 76 pound flasks reported by Bruce Lawrence.

5. Ric Erdheim, NEMA Mercury Source Reduction and Recycling, Paper Presented at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Research and Development's Workshop on Mercury in Products, Processes, Waste, and the Environment: Eliminating, Reducing and Managing Risks for Non-Combustion Sources, Baltimore, March 23, 2000.

6. Conversation with Peter Bleasby, Osram-Sylvania, April 6, 2000.

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