We will be presenting a poster at the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change display booth at INC5, starting tomorrow and running until the end of the negotiating session. Our poster summarizes recent scientific findings of relevance to the mercury negotiations. If you’re at the INC, please stop by to see us!
Download a copy here: MIT Mercury poster at INC5
by Leah Stokes and Rebecca Saari
Each year, humans mobilize around 2000 tonnes of mercury, with about 90% emitted to the air and 10% released to land and water. Since releasing mercury leads to environmental and human health impacts, addressing emissions and releases needs to be a central part of the global mercury treaty.
The draft text of the treaty, developed during the INC4 in Uruguay, distinguishes between emissions to the atmosphere and releases to land and water. However, the extent of controls on anthropogenic emissions remains to be seen, and it is possible that releases will be excluded altogether.
UNEP’s 2013 estimation of 2010 emissions from each global region. These estimations significantly changed since the 2008 reports, where East and Southeast Asia was estimated to contribute two-thirds of global emissions. These changes likely reflect a reduction in the estimation of mercury from coal power plants in Asia and an increase in the estimation of mercury from ASGM in Sub-Saharan Africa and South America.
Currently, almost 40% of mercury emissions come from East and Southeast Asia. Many developed countries have significant regulations on emissions, and the treaty is in part an effort to have all countries adopt standards. Yet most historic emissions came from the developed world. As is the case with climate change negotiations, this dynamic raises equity issues – mainly, who should pay: past emitters or current emitters?
Unlike carbon dioxide, however, mercury is toxic with acute health and environmental impacts, and its release is not tightly coupled with countries’ GDP. For this reason, all countries should be interested in reducing their mercury emissions and releases.
UNEP’s 2013 report, “Time to Act” recently updated the proportion of emissions from each source in 2010. ASGM is now the largest estimated source of emissions, with coal plants in second place.
About one-quarter of all global mercury emissions to air come from coal-fired combustion, including power plants and industrial boilers. This suggests an important aim for the treaty is reducing mercury emissions from coal-fired power and heating. There are many ways to achieve this, including pre-treatment of coal and various post-combustion technologies. These options also reduce co-emissions of other harmful air pollutants, and conventional post-combustion treatment can be enhanced to remove 80-90% of mercury emissions. Mercury-specific post-combustion control, which can achieve 90% mercury removal, is also available.
With a variety of emissions control options available, and significant variation in the mercury content of coal, the Chair and delegates are challenged to set appropriate goals and measures. When asked, most countries that currently regulate mercury responded that they employ emissions limits, or limits to the amount of mercury exiting a stack (flue gas concentrations).
Thus far, proposed flue gas limits range from 0.01 to 0.2 mg/m3. For reference, 0.05 mg/mg3 is one of the highest values measured at a series of US plants with limited pollution control through a fabric filter and a low-NOx boiler. In other words, a standard set as high as 0.2 mg/m3 could imply almost no control technology at all (See document: UNEP(DTIE)/Hg/INC.5/4 for more details). Ultimately, the level of control technology required will dramatically affect the treaty’s effectiveness.
While coal-related emissions present a clear priority, other mercury emissions are challenging to address, since they comes from a wide variety of sources, including: gold, cement and metal production, the chlor-alkali industry, waste incineration and dental amalgams. The Chair’s most recent updates also highlighted mining tailings, and sewage and wastewater treatment plants as potential sources. Over one-third of all emissions are from artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM), which is addressed in a separate part of the treaty. Decisions on ASGM will dramatically affect global emissions, given that the UNEP 2013 report recently named it the largest source of emissions.
This week, countries have many decisions to make on mercury emissions and releases. Which sources should be controlled—existing or new plants, and from which industries? For examples, it is currently unclear whether the oil and gas sector will be included as a source.
Should small sources be exempted from requirements to inventory and reduce their emissions, and if so, what would the threshold be for a “small” source? Potential thresholds for required controls are listed in the Chair’s documents. For example, coal-fired power plants smaller than 50 MW could be exempted from mercury control technology. For context, 20% of all US coal units are 50 MW or smaller, meaning that this threshold could exempt a significant proportion of plants.
What should the goal be – should the treaty set reduction goals, emission limits, or require best available techniques? As the discussion about flue gas concentrations implies, these standards will have significant consequences. And finally, how flexible should the requirements be—should countries have to commit to specific standards, or can they develop flexible national plans and report at a later date?
The draft text reflects many of these debates. Article 10, which addresses atmospheric emissions, has two options: one, which would require goals, best available techniques or emissions limits; the other, which would require national plans. These issues and many more will need to be decided in the coming week. Decisions on atmospheric emissions and releases to land and water are essential to shaping the treaty’s ultimate environmental and health impacts.
Are you interested in mercury science and policy? Do you teach an introductory science or environmental issues class and want to include a science-policy element? Do you want to explore science-policy interactions with your colleagues or lab group? We’ve created the Mercury Game to teach people about the role of science in international environmental policy making in an interactive and fun environment — and it’s free to download!
The mercury game is a role-play simulation for ten players aimed at scientists, students and decision makers. Playing the game will help participants explore the consequences of representing scientific uncertainty in various ways in a policy context. The game focuses on the credibility of various sources of technical information, strategies for representing risk and uncertainty, and the balance between scientific and political considerations. The game also requires players to grapple with politics – it explores the dynamic between the global “North” (the developed world) and the global “South” (the developing world) at the heart of most treaty-making difficulties.
For more information on the game, see this video, featuring our own Leah Stokes. Leah wrote the game along with Noelle Selin and Lawrence Susskind at MIT.
by Alice Alpert and Julie van der Hoop
If the global mercury treaty is adopted but does not include any support for countries that lack the resources to implement it, it is unlikely to achieve its goals. Therefore, Section I of the treaty seeks to establish a framework by which developed countries can assist developing countries in implementing and complying with the treaty by outlining financial and technical assistance measures.
It is easy for parties to agree to provide the resources needed to implement the treaty, but what does that mean? The first step is to establish a mechanism for this assistance: like a fund. The administration and oversight of this fund is a huge issue. Developing countries say the money is “theirs”—that it has basically been given to them and thus they should be controlling it. Developed countries say that, since they are providing the money, they should decide who gets it and what is done with it. Developed countries typically want funds to be part of an existing institution, the Global Environment Facility, to which they already contribute and have influence over. In contrast, developing countries generally prefer a new and independent fund. There will be a separate provision for how the fund will be administered and what activities it will support. This sets up potential redundancies and conflicts, but also opens up opportunities for give-and-take negotiation.
Section I of the treaty is also addresses technical assistance and technology transfer. Technical assistance can be explained as helping a country adopt a technology through capacity building and training. Technology transfer refers to the distribution of intellectual property rights.
In the case of mercury, transferring technologies to reduce emissions from coal plants or to produce mercury alternatives would need to be shared between the countries that conceived them and those who need to implement them. Technology transfer, however, is a contentious issue, and it’s no surprise that there are two options for this section of the treaty text: 1) create mechanisms for the transfer of technology to developing countries to assess, review, develop, present, and establish a process for technology transfer, and 2) “consider the technology challenges of developing country parties” and promote mutually agreed upontechnology transfer. The latter is greatly favored by developed countries, while developing countries would prefer option 2. However, some countries would prefer that the treaty not include technology transfer at all. Clearly, this is going to be a major point of discussion during the treaty talks this week.
Looking at the financial and technical assistance issue overall, developing countries are most interested in obtaining aid, while developed countries don’t want to take too much responsibility for funds, although they stand to gain health benefits from decreased mercury emissions. There is high potential for gridlock over questions of how to apportion funds, who owns the global fund, and who gives and gets—these questions should make for some interesting dialogue during the upcoming week!
As with most global environmental and health issues, there is an intersection between social, environmental, and development issues here. Inclusion of all countries is critical given major sources and emitters, but this requires a great deal of understanding and negotiation for developed countries to meet potential obligations.
We’re curious to see how the discussion over financial and technical assistance plays out!