MARINE POLLUTION: Heavy Metals What is contamination?

Contamination is caused when an input from human activities causes the increase of a substance in seawater, sediments, or organisms above the natural background level for that area and for those organisms. Heavy metal pollution High atomic weight metals (mercury, lead etc.) Sometimes the term trace elements is used to include non-metal and lower atomic weight elements Many of these elements are essential to the body in very low concentrations: Iron essential for hemoglobin Copper - essential for hemocyanin (in invertebrates) Cobalt in vitamin B12 Zinc essential component of many enzymes But in high concentrations these can be toxic. e.g. one asprin tablet is a useful medicine, but 100 tablets are lethal Some heavy metals have no essential function in the body (e.g. mercury, lead) and any concentrations can be harmful Bioaccumulation Pollutants like heavy metals are CONSERVATIVE pollutants i.e. they arent broken down by bacteria etc and are effectively permanent. Most plants and animals can regulate their metal content to a certain point but metals that cant be excreted build up in an organism over its lifetime= BIOACCUMULATION Animals feeding on bioaccumulators take in a higher level of contaminants, which bioaccumulate within themselves Those animals feeding on them gain even higher inputs of contaminants, and bioaccumulate even greater concentrations and so on with animals at the highest trophic level obtaining highest concentrations= BIOMAGNIFICATION i.e. long-living, top predators bioaccumulate and biomagnify the highest contaminant levels Sources of heavy metal pollution ATMOSPHERIC Forest fires Volcanic activity Dust particles Anthropogenic emissions coal fired power stations car exhausts

ATMOSPHERIC Metals can be transferred by the atmosphere in gas or particle form (aerosol) Particles can fall from the atmosphere onto the land or sea = dry deposition Also precipitation can carry particles or dissolved gases = wet deposition

Gaseous state elements (Boron, Mercury, Selenium) can also dissolve at the surface of water bodies (gaseous exchange) Bubbles breaking the surface of the sea can release salt particles containing metals can travels from sea to atmosphere as well as atmosphere to sea RIVERS Erosion of rocks containing metals Surface runoff sweeps up naturally formed and anthropogenic metal particles Metals often bind with sediments and are deposited on the seabed but these can enter the marine environment again is there is: Dredging Trawling Severe weather GROUNDWATER SEEPAGE Dissolved substances are carried via ground water movement contamination in soil may be picked up by the moving waters DELIBERATE DISCHARGE Contaminated waste dumping Industrial discharges Sewage

Toxic effects of mercury Mercury can cause neurological damage, immune system suppression and can cause fetal abnormalities in mammals In humans it has been associated with various neurological effects, abnormal development and heart damage Mercury toxicity 1. In human adults mercury toxicity symptoms include: Visual field constriction Behavioral changes, memory loss, headaches Tremor, loss of fine motor control, spasticity Hair loss 2. If fetuses / infants are exposed to mercury: Mental retardation Seizures Cerebral palsy Blindness and deafness Disturbances of swallowing, sucking, and speech Hypertonia - muscle rigidity Mercury in the marine environment identified as a health risk for humans Minamata disease In 1952 a factory in Minamata Japan was using mercury as a catalys mercury washed into bay

In 1953 fishermen and farmers showed symptoms neurological damage and fetal deformity etc. Minamata disease Disease diagnosed in 1956 linked to fish consumption 1957 fishing banned in area 1959 mercury identified as cause 1960 source identified factory effluent 2000 cases 41 deaths and 700 permanent disabilities CONTROVERSIAL: Mercury and US Policy During the Clinton Administration the Environmental Protection Agency conducted research on the impacts of mercury and the role of coal-fired power plants in mercury emissions.

 The EPA introduced a plan in which mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants would be reduced by 90% by 2008. The Bush Administration altered these plans: emissions would be lowered by only 70% by 2018. Under the Bush plan, you will have seven times more mercury released into the waters than if we just simply followed the Clean Air Act as it is written today. There will be no overall reduction in mercury. Every other major source of pollution has been subject to the requirements of the Clean Air Act, until now. The Bush Administration has simply decided that the coal-fired power industry will be exempt. Felice Stradler of the National Wildlife Federation Several states decided the Bush Administration plan is insufficient and are attempting to follow the original Clinton Administration plan is too lenient and they will follow the original. CADMIUM (Cd) Cadmium was used in: Electroplating, solder and as a pigment for plastics But less frequently now due to health concerns Main sources of current production: By product of zinc mining Nickel-Cadmium battery production Other sources: Burning coal (0.25-0.5 ppm) and oil (0.3ppm) Wearing down of car tyres (20-90 ppm) Corrosion of galvanised metal (impurity: 0.2% Cd) Phosphate fertilisers (phosphate rock 100 ppm Cd) Sewage sludge (30 ppm) Input of Cadmium into oceans: 8000 tons/year- 50% anthropogenic TOXIC EFFECTS High cadmium levels can lead to: depressed growth, kidney damage, cardiac enlargement, hypertension, foetal deformity, cancer In humans cadmium concentrations above 200-400 ppm in kidney tissue can lead to renal damage LEAD (Pb) Lead is used in: Battery casings, pipes, sheets etc 43 million tons produced a year 10% of lead production is for lead-based additives for gas (e.g. tetraethyl lead) High levels of lead have been found in marine life near areas of high car density - e.g. 10 ppm in fish caught 300 miles off California coast - High levels of lead in UK cetaceans were attributed to lead additives in fuel (up to 4.3 ppm wet weight ~ 14 ppm dry weight) [Law et al., (1992)] The toxic effects of lead include: anaemia, kidney damage, hypertension, cardiac disease, Immune system suppression (antibody inhibition) neurological damage OTHER HEAVY METALS OF CONCERN Aluminium

Arsenic Copper chromium Iron Silver Nickel Zinc linked with decreasing health in porpoises (Das et al., 2004) Tin