Title: Present and Future Activities
1Present and Future Activities of the Mercury Air
Transport and Fate Research Partnership Area -
UNEP Mercury Programme - Nicola
Pirrone Director CNR-Institute of Atmospheric
Pollution Research, Rome, Italy Chair of the
UNEP FT pirrone_at_iia.cnr.it C-MERC
Workshop 8-10 September 2010, Portsmouth, NH
2Objectives of FT Partnership
- To support the decision of the GC and
specifically the activity of the overarching
partnership by - Accelerating the development of sound scientific
information to address uncertainties and data
gaps in global mercury cycling and its patterns. - Enhancing sharing of such information among
scientists and between them and policymakers. - Providing technical assistance and training,
where possible, to support the development of
critical information. - Enhancing the development of a globally-coordinate
d mercury observation system in cooperation with
the GEO Task HE-09-02d. -
- Enhancing the exchange of information and
cooperation with the Task Force on Hemispheric
Transport of Air Pollutants (TF HTAP) of the
UNECE-LRTAP Convention.
3FT Partners
- CANADA Grace Holland, Kristina Rudnitski,
Heather Morrison several scientific experts
(i.e., Ashu Dastoor) - USA Stan Durkee, Merilyn Engle, Frasso Kathryn
several experts i.e., Elsie Sunderland, Dan
Jaffe, Rob Mason, L. Levin, J. Lin, etc. - ITALY Nicola Pirrone, Ian Hedgecock, Francesca
Sprovieri, Alessandra Fino, Sergio Cinnirella,
etc. - JAPAN Noriyuki Suzuki, Koyou Ogasawasa, Terai
Toru, Takeshi Sekiya - SOUTH AFRICA Joy Leaner
- SLOVENIA Milena Horvat
- UNEP Brenda Koekkoek, Gunnar Futser, Pascale
Unger - CHINA Jiming Hao, Shuxiao Wang
- Helen Keenan through the GSAMP (Group of
Scientists on Aspects of Marine Pollution)
program, includes Mason, Horvat, Hurley and
others. Producing a report on Mercury in the
Marine Environment
4Status of current partnership activities
- UNEP Mercury Air Transport and Fate Research
Partnership Area (FT) 2005 - Contributed to UNEP Mercury Programme and other
international programs (i.e., GEO Task HE-09-02d
/ GEOSS) and Conventions (UNECE-LRTAP-T HTAP). - 2009 FT report - Mercury Fate and Transport in
the Global Atmosphere Emissions, Measurements
and Models, Springer - Cooperation with TF HTAP (UNECE-LRTAP) - Report
Part-B Mercury currently under review (2010)
(Pirrone, N. and Terry Keeting, Editors) . Others
involved include Mason, Sunderland, Levin etc - Leadership of the project Global Mercury
Observation System GMOS funded by the
European Commission - will start on Nov. 1st with
kick-off on Nov. 17-19, 2010 in Rome. - Further development of the overarching approach
of the FT - start up of the GEO Task HE-09-02d
"Global Monitoring Plan for Atmospheric Mercury"
and more recently the GMOS which are part of the
GEOSS program and is aimed to support the goals
and objectives of the FT and TF HTAP.
5FT 2009 Report
In February 2009 , as contribution to the 25th
session of the UNEP GC (Nairobi, February 2009),
the report was published as a book. Mercury
Fate and Transport in the Global Atmosphere
Emissions, Measurements and Models. Springer,
USA (Pirrone and Mason, Eds.) Over 70 scientists
contributed to the preparation of this report. 21
chapters. 8 deal with emissions, 7 deal with
experimental data and measurements and 6 deal
with various models
6from FT HTAP reports
Recommendations
- Observational networks
- The establishment of a coordinated global
monitoring network is highly recommended. - Such a mercury network should be closely linked
to existing sites with globally representative
distribution and a long-term perspective, such
as WMO GAW sites - It should be ensured that this measurement
network is strongly supported by regional and
global modelling, for scenario analysis and to
support decision making for protecting human and
environmental health. - The combination of intermittent shipboard and
long-term ground measurements can provide
information about the worldwide distribution and
trend of atmospheric Hg. - More effort should be dedicated to Deposition
Networks with large spatial coverage and
long-term perspective -
7from FT HTAP reports
Recommendations
- Atmospheric chemistry and source attribution
- Better understanding of the interplay of sources
and removal processes. - Better understanding of which sites would respond
most quickly to changes in emissions and which
sites are independent of local or regional
sources and predominantly influenced by the
global pool. - Need more long-term data and spatial coverage to
understand long-term changes in RGM and PM. - Intercontinental transport of mercury can be
estimated from Hg/CO measurements at fixed
stations however, more emphasis should be
addressed to the question why results based on
this approach differ significantly from emission
estimates.
8Brief overview of GMOS
An important contribution to the future
development of the GEO Task HE-09-02d, FT and
UNECE-HTAP will be provided by GMOS in addition
to the contributions from other countries that
act as Co-Leads and as Contributors.
- Status of Play
- The European Commission just approved for funding
the proposal Global Mercury Observation System
GMOS with a total budget of about 9 M. - GMOS Coordinator Nicola Pirrone, CNR-IIA, Italy
- GMOS involves 24 partners from all over the world
about 10 external partners (PI of other
programs). Milena Horvat can give more details. - GMOS will start in Nov. 2010 and will end in 2015.
9GMOS Ground-Based Observation System
Additional Activities 1. Atmospheric collections
during commercial aircraft flights to North and
South America, Asia and South Africa 2. Ocean
cruises - North, equatorial and South
Pacific/Southern Ocean North and South Atlantic
10GMOS Overarching Objectives
- To establish a Global Observation System for
Mercury able to provide ambient concentrations
and deposition fluxes of mercury species around
the world, by combining observations from
permanent ground-based stations, and from
oceanographic and tropospheric measurement
campaigns. - To validate regional and global scale atmospheric
mercury modelling systems able to predict the
temporal variations and spatial distributions of
ambient concentrations of atmospheric mercury,
and Hg fluxes to and from terrestrial and aquatic
receptors. - To evaluate and identify source-receptor
relationships at country scale and their temporal
trends for current and projected scenarios of
mercury emissions from anthropogenic and natural
sources. - To develop interoperable tools to allow the
sharing of observational and models output data
produced by GMOS, for the purposes of research
and policy development and implementation as well
as at enabling societal benefits of Earth
observations, including advances in scientific
understanding in the nine Societal Benefit Areas
(SBA) established in GEOSS.
11Possible FT partnership future activities
- Possible contribution of FT to paragraph 29 of
decision 25/5 III of the Governing Council/Global
Ministerial Environ. Forum of UNEP - Partners involved in the TF HTAP provide
information for the 29. - Partners providing any available information on
costs and effectiveness of alternative control
technologies and measures - Review of a "zero draft"
- Any other possible contribution..
- Close cooperation with GMOS, GEO Task HE 09-02d
and TF HTAP to assure the efficient sharing of
information, capacity building and advancement of
science. - Possible linkages with .(for example, other
air-emissions-related partnership areas, i.e.,
Coal Combustion) - Expanding the focus of the FT to include aquatic
transport and fate as well as exposure - International workshop in 2012.