Mercury Uses and Sources

Mercury is a metallic element easily distinguished from all others by its liquidity at even the lowest temperatures occurring in moderate climates. Mercury was unknown to the ancient Hebrews or the early Greeks, and the first mention of mercury is by Theophrastus, writing around 300 BCE, stating that mercury was extracted from ciimabar by treatment with copper and vinegar. 

Domestic production of mercury produced as a by-product was 207 metric tons in 

180 tons in 1991, and 160 tons in 1992 during this same period, the U.S. imported 15 tons in 1990, 56 tons in 1991, and 100 tons in 1992. 

Atmospheric input of mercury has tripled over the past 150 years. The atmosphere plays an important role in the mobilization of mercury with 25-30% of the total atmospheric mercury burden of anthropogenic origin, although more recent estimates of 67% are significantly higher. As a direct result of human activities, mercury levels in river sediments have increased fourfold since precultural times, and twofold to fivefold in sediment cores from lakes and estuaries. Analysis of sediment cores of North American mid-continental lakes show that mercury deposition rates increased by a factor of 3.7 since 1850, at a rate of about 2% annually. During the past 100 years, more than 500,000 metric tons of mercury entered the atmosphere, hydrosphere, and surface soils, with eventual deposition in subsurface soils and sediments. 

Mercury catalysts were used in the production of acetaldehyde, acetic acid, and vinyl chloride. The major use of mercury in the decade 1959-1969 has been as a cathode in the electrolytic preparation of chlorine and caustic. In 1968, this use accounted for about 33% of the total U.S. demand for mercury. In that same period, electrical apparatus accounted for about 27% of U.S. mercury consumption industrial and control instruments, such as 

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