Mercury Fate and Transport in the Global Atmosphere Nicola Pirrone • Robert Mason Editors Mercury Fate and Transport in the Global Atmosphere Emissions, Measurements and Models Editors Nicola Pirrone Robert Mason CNR-Institute for Atmospheric Pollution Department of Marine Sciences Rome University of Connecticut Italy Groton, Connecticut, USA ISBN: 978-0-387-93957-5 e-ISBN: 978-0-387-93958-2 DOI: 10.1007/978-0-387-93958-2 Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York Library of Congress Control Number: 2008942799 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2009 All rights reserved. This work may not be translated or copied in whole or in part without the written permission of the publisher (Springer Science + Business Media, LLC, 233 Spring Street, New York, NY 10013, USA), except for brief excerpts in connection with reviews or scholarly analysis. Use in connection with any form of information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed is forbidden. The use in this publication of trade names, trademarks, service marks, and similar terms, even if they are not identified as such, is not to be taken as an expression of opinion as to whether or not they are subject to proprietary rights. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer Science + Business Media (www.springer.com) Preface During the last decade the importance of environmental issues related to mercury released to the atmosphere by major anthropogenic sources, which include, but are not limited to, power plants for energy production and a variety of industrial plants, has gained growing attention for their effects on human health and ecosystems. In this framework the UNEP Mercury Programme started, beginning in 2002, a process to assess to what extent contamination by mercury released from anthropo- genic and natural sources may affect human health and ecosystems. A number of concerted initiatives have been undertaken on a global scale to assess the current state of our knowledge regarding atmospheric mercury emissions and transport, its deposition to and evasion from terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, and also to evaluate the relative contributions of natural and anthropogenic sources to the glo- bal atmospheric mercury budget. At the beginning of 2005 the Governing Council of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP-GC) urged (Decision 23/9 IV), governments, inter-governmental and nongovernmental organizations and the private sector to develop and implement partnerships as one approach to reducing the risks to human health and the environment from the release of mercury and its compounds, by improving global understanding of international mercury emission sources, fate and transport. In this framework, the UNEP Global Partnership for Mercury Air Transport and Fate Research (UNEP-MFTP) was initiated in 2005 aiming to encourage collaborative research activities on different aspects of atmos- pheric mercury cycling on local to hemispheric and global scales. Members of the UNEP-MFTP are, Italy (lead), Canada, Japan, South Africa, United States, Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), Natural Resources Defence Council (NRDC) and UNEP. Since 2005, the UNEP-MFTP has met four times. The first meeting was held in Madison, Wisconsin in conjunction with the 8th International Conference of Mercury as a Global Pollutant, followed by the meeting in Gatineau, Quebec, Canada (9-10 January 2007) which aimed to dis- cuss and define the elements included in Decision 23/9 IV. A 3rd meeting was held in Washington, D.C. on 10-11 October 2007 to review the Business Plan of the UNEP-MFTP, which was submitted (February 2008) to UNEP Chemicals, whereas the 4th meeting of the partnership was held in Rome (7-11 April 2008) in conjunc- tion with the international workshop jointly organised by the UNEPMFTP and the Task Force on Hemispheric Transport of Air Pollution (TF HTAP) of the UNECE v vi Preface Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution, in which leading sci- entists from all over the world presented their contributions to the UNEP-MFTP Technical Report. This book is the technical report the UNEP-MFTP provided to UNEP Chemicals, governments, inter-governmental and non-governmental organisations as well as the private sector, as a contribution to the ongoing work within the Open- Ended Working Group (OEWG) in charge of preparing the input to the next UNEP Governing Council. The book highlights major issues related to the interactions of mercury with terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, and evaluates the relative con- tribution of anthropogenic and natural sources to the global atmospheric mercury budget. The preparation of this report has been made possible thanks to the con- tributions of all the members of the UNEP-MFTP, and of more than 70 scientists from leading universities and research institutions recognised as worldwide experts on different aspects related to the emissions, monitoring and modelling of mercury in the atmosphere and other environmental compartments. The draft of this report was delivered to UNEP Chemicals in February 2008 as a contribution to the Open- Ended Mercury Working Group of UNEP Chemicals (meeting held in Bangkok in November 2008) and to the UNEP Governing Council (meeting held in Nairobi, February 2009). Dr. Nicola Pirrone Chair of the UNEP-MFTP CNR-Institute for Atmospheric Pollution Rome, Italy Acknowledgments As Chair of the UNEP-MFTP I would like to express my gratitude to the members of the partnership for their continued support to the activity of the partnership dur- ing the last three years. I would like to acknowledge the support received from the Italian Ministry for the Environment, Land and Sea; special thanks to Dr. Corrado Clini, Director General of the Department for Environmental Research and Development for his continued support. The preparation of this technical report would have not been possible without the great contribution of all colleagues that have led the preparation of the chapters and to all co-authors that have provided valuable contributions. The contribution of the external reviewers is greatly acknowledged. Special thanks to the co-Editor, Dr. Robert Mason who has provided continued and full support during these months. I would like to acknowledge the great contribution from both co-chairs of the TF HTAP, Dr. Andre Zuber and Dr. Terry Keating who have provided timely input to the activity of the UNEP-MFTP and to the preparation of this technical report. I would like to express special thanks to my staff, Dr. Sergio Cinnirella, Dr. Ian M. Hedgecock, Dr. Gerlinde Jung and Dr. Francesca Sprovieri for their hard work and time dedicated to the preparation of this book, and to my secretary, Mrs Maria Orrico, for her hard work in formatting and preparing the final edited version of the book. Dr. Nicola Pirrone Chair of the UNEP-MFTP CNR-Institute for Atmospheric Pollution Rome, Italy vii Contents Part I Sources of Mercury Released to the Global Atmosphere 1 Global Mercury Emissions to the Atmosphere from Natural and Anthropogenic Sources ...................................................... 3 Nicola Pirrone, Sergio Cinnirella, Xinbin Feng, Robert B. Finkelman, Hans R. Friedli, Joy Leaner, Rob Mason, Arun B. Mukherjee, Glenn Stracher, David G. Streets, and Kevin Telmer 2 Mercury Emissions from Coal Combustion in China .......................... 51 David G. Streets, Jiming Hao, Shuxiao Wang, and Ye Wu 3 Mercury Emissions from Industrial Sources in China ......................... 67 Xinbin Feng, David Streets, Jiming Hao, Ye Wu, and Guanghui Li 4 Mercury Emissions from Industrial Sources in India and its Effects in the Environment ......................................................... 81 Arun B. Mukherjee, Prosun Bhattacharya, Atanu Sarkar, and Ron Zevenhoven 5 Mercury Emissions from Point Sources in South Africa...................... 113 Joy J. Leaner, James M. Dabrowski, Robert P. Mason, Tabby Resane, Marguerite Richardson, Martin Ginster, Gerhard Gericke, Chantel R. Petersen, Elizabeth Masekoameng, Peter J. Ashton, and Kevin Murray 6 World Emissions of Mercury from Artisanal and Small Scale Gold Mining.................................................................. 131 Kevin H. Telmer and Marcello M. Veiga ix x Contents 7 Mercury Emissions from Natural Processes and their Importance in the Global Mercury Cycle ............................. 173 Robert P. Mason 8 Mercury Emissions from Global Biomass Burning: Spatial and Temporal Distribution ........................................................... 193 Hans. R. Friedli, Avelino F. Arellano, Jr., Sergio Cinnirella, and Nicola Pirrone Part II Spatial Coverage and Temporal Trends of Mercury Measurements 9 Spatial Coverage and Temporal Trends of Land-based Atmospheric Mercury Measurements in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres ..................................................................... 223 Ralf Ebinghaus, Catharine Banic, Steve Beauchamp, Dan Jaffe, Hans Herbert Kock, Nicola Pirrone, Laurier Poissant, Francesca Sprovieri, and Peter S. Weiss-Penzias 10 Spatial Coverage and Temporal Trends of Atmospheric Mercury Measurements in Polar Regions ............................................. 293 Aurélien Dommergue, Christophe P. Ferrari, Marc Amyot, Steve Brooks, Francesca Sprovieri, and Alexandra Steffen 11 Spatial Coverage and Temporal Trends of Over-Water, Air-Surface Exchange, Surface and Deep Sea Water Mercury Measurements .........................................................................