This is very good news from United States for reducing mercury pollution guys... and it shows how President Obama commits to international environmental issues. Representatives from more than 140 countries signed onto a new United Nations agreement which calls for coordinated global cuts in the use and release of mercury. Mercury is a dangerous neurotoxin associated with industrial activities. Last week’s landmark agreement follows on the heels of the Obama administration pledging to overturn a Bush era plan to allow some U.S. power plants to increase mercury emissions despite the health and ecological risks. According to U.N. insiders, the American turnaround on the issue helped convince China and India, the world’s two fastest developing large nations, to agree with the proposed emissions cuts.
A forthcoming legally binding international treaty slated to be enacted by 2013 will reduce the intentional use of mercury in industrial processes and products and will limit emissions of the neurotoxin from coal-fired power plants and smelters, while also mandating cleanups of mercury waste sites.
Environmentalists hope that the American policy change on mercury emissions foreshadows a similar about-face from the U.S. on its willingness to participate in a global treaty to limit emissions of greenhouse gases. The Bush administration staunchly opposed signing onto the Kyoto Protocol aimed at mitigating or forestalling global warming.
Hopefully this is the positive initial step from President Obama in facing environmental issue challenges all over the world. How about other world leaders in answering environmental global issues?
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