Introduction
This Mercury Inventory has been compiled for the Ministry for the Environment (MfE) as part of the information needed to inform the potential development of a product stewardship programme for lighting in New Zealand. The need for a product stewardship programme arose as a result of the Efficient Lighting Group’s1 New Zealand Efficient Lighting Strategy, which was released in 2008. The strategy recommended, in part, a large scale shift towards the use of energy efficient lamps in New Zealand, including compact fluorescent lamps. Increasing the use of energy efficient lamps caused concern about the impact on the environment from the disposal of mercury-containing lamps, thus warranting consideration of the need for a product stewardship programme.
Phase 1 of the product stewardship programme, which was completed in January 2008, and is entitled New Zealand Lighting Industry Product Stewardship Scheme – Phase 1 Assessment and Review (Stewardship Solutions, 2008), included an assessment of the current status of the lighting industry and its environmental impacts in New Zealand.
Prior to moving on to Phases II and III of the programme, some information gaps needed to be overcome. Specifically, the mercury contribution and associated environmental impact from mercury-containing lamps compared to the mercury contribution and associated environmental impact from other sources (natural and anthropogenic). This mercury inventory was commissioned to fill the information gaps.
This report aims to meet eight key objectives:
- Summarise the general impact mercury poses on the environment.
- Identify the various contributors of mercury to New Zealand’s environment.
- Present exposure scenarios for natural and anthropogenic sources.
- Quantify New Zealand’s total annual mercury load.
- Compare anthropogenic mercury loads and total mercury loads to the mercury loads expected from certain types of lamps.
- Assess the relative contribution of mercury from mercury lamps over the next ten years compared to anthropogenic mercury loads and total mercury loads.
- Compare New Zealand’s relative mercury hazard in relation to other countries.
- Provide a summary statement of mercury pollution controls in New Zealand and overseas.
These key objectives have been addressed in five report sections. Section I provides a background into mercury in the New Zealand environment (Objective 1). It briefly details the different forms of mercury and outlines the different mercury pathways and transformations that occur between different sectors of the environment in New Zealand and globally (e.g. atmosphere, land and water). Section I concludes with some comments on mercury problems in the environment.
Section II provides the mercury inventory for New Zealand. In this section, the various sources of mercury in New Zealand have been identified and quantified, including anthropogenic and natural, utilising the UNEP Toolkit (2005). Mercury from mercury-containing lamps is also quantified and a comparison of New Zealand’s mercury emissions is made with six other OECD countries (Objectives 2, 4, 5 and 7). Section II relies heavily on information provided by various industries, various databases and the literature generally.
Data limitations were encountered when compiling the inventory. For example, no data was available to quantify the numbers of mercury-containing products in circulation in New Zealand, nor was any data available on the quantity of mercury in landfills. Consequently a complete inventory was not possible. Data limitations for particular items have been noted against the items.
Section III of the report outlines the risk associated with mercury in the environment. It presents different scenarios for significant environmental sources of mercury, both anthropogenic and non-anthropogenic and includes an assessment of the absolute and comparative environmental risks arising from these sources (Objective 3). It was not possible to compare New Zealand’s risk with other countries, as data was not available in a form that allowed a ready comparison.
Section IV includes predictions of the relative mercury contributions from anthropogenic loads, and total mercury loads in ten years’ time, and compares these with the expected load from mercury-containing lamps (Objective 6). The predictions are based on the contributions calculated in Section II of this report.
Section V summarises the different mercury pollution control mechanisms currently in place in New Zealand, and compares them with control practices that are used around the world (Objective 8).
1 The Efficient Lighting Group was formed by the Electricity Commission, the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority and the Lighting Council New Zealand under a Terms of Reference that included the development of an ‘integrated lighting strategy’.
