June 17, 2003 – Canada’s federal and provincial environment ministers may soon order coal-fired power plants across the country to reduce their mercury emissions by 90%.
Ministers express concern about the harmful effect mercury can have on health. The proposal, which was not accompanied by an estimate of the costs it could incur, was made public earlier this week. If adopted, the reduction imposed on power plants should have been reached by 2010.
Coal naturally contains traces of mercury. When charcoal is burned, the mercury soars into the environment before falling again with rain or snow. Once in the waterways, bacteria convert it to methyl mercury, a very toxic substance that easily accumulates in the body of fish. All provinces and territories in Canada advise limiting the consumption of fish caught in their waters.
Different studies have claimed that mercury can have a devastating impact on the cognitive and neurological capacities of those exposed to it. Recently, researchers found that the Brazilian fishermen they were studying had difficulty with certain fine motor tasks, such as threading beads on a thread, and believed that the mercury in their diet could be to blame.
Health Canada also advises pregnant women (or thinking of becoming pregnant) and young children to limit their consumption of certain fish containing high concentrations of mercury to one meal per month, such as sharks, swordfish, tuna and seafood. marlin, lest this substance be transmitted to the fetus and harm its development. However, a recent study indicated that the magnitude of this threat may have been exaggerated (see the PasseportSanté.net article on this subject, dated May 16, 2003).
In Canada, coal-fired power plants are concentrated in the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. In 1999, Canadian power plants released 2,450 kilograms of mercury into the environment.
Jean-Benoit Legault – PasseportSanté.net
From Globe and Mail and WebMD; June 6 and 15, 2003.
