Science of the Total Environment 368 (2006) 397 – 402

www.elsevier.com/locate/scitotenv

Emissions of mercury and other trace elements from

coal-fired power plants in Japan
Shigeo Ito a,*, Takahisa Yokoyama b,1, Kazuo Asakura b,1
a
Energy Engineering Research Laboratory, Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry (CRIEPI),
2-6-1 Nagasaka, Yokosuka-shi, Kanagawa-ken, 240-0196 Japan
b
Environmental Science Research Laboratory, Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry (CRIEPI),
1646 Abiko, Abiko-shi, Chiba-ken, 270-1194 Japan
Received 19 October 2004; received in revised form 11 August 2005; accepted 12 September 2005
Available online 11 October 2005

Abstract

To evaluate trace element emissions from modern coal-fired power plants into the atmospheric environment in Japan, trace
elements in the coal used in electric utility boilers, stack concentrations, emission rates and emission ratios of coal-fired power plants,
and proportions of trace elements in coal-fired power plants were studied. The elements were As, B, Be, Cd, Co, Cr, F, Hg, Mn, Ni, Pb,
Sb, Se and V, which are designated in the Law of Pollutant Release and Transfer Register. The particulate trace elements were
collected in an electrostatic precipitator and a wet desulfurization scrubber. Emissions into the atmosphere were lower than 1% of the
quantity in coal, but the volatile trace elements showed somewhat higher emission ratios. For mercury, the mean concentration in coal
was 0.045 ppm, the mean emission rate was 4.4 Ag/kW h, and the mean emission ratio was 27%, the highest ratio among all elements
in this study. The total annual emission of mercury from coal-fired power plants of the electric power industry in Japan was estimated
to be 0.63 t/y. On the basis of these data, the atmospheric environment loads from a coal-fired power station were investigated. The
calculation of stack gas dispersion showed that maximum annual mean ground level concentrations were in the order of 10 2 to 10 5
of the background concentrations, and that the adverse effect of the emissions from the coal-fired power station was small.
D 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Coal; Power plant; Trace element; Mercury; Emission; Environmental load

1. Introduction plants. In Japan, most coal-fired power plants have al-

Recently, coal combustion has been recognized as the
major anthropogenic emission source of mercury in the
world. In the United States, SO2, NOx and mercury are
the major air pollutants of concern from coal-fired power
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +81 46 856 2121; fax: +81 46 857
5829.
E-mail addresses: sito@criepi.denken.or.jp (S. Ito),
takahisa@criepi.denken.or.jp (T. Yokoyama),
asakura@criepi.denken.or.jp (K. Asakura).
1
Tel.: +81 4 7182 1181; fax: +81 4 7183 2966.
0048-9697/$ - see front matter D 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2005.09.044
ready installed NOx , particulate (PM) and SOx control
facilities, such as a selective catalytic reduction (SCR)
system for NOx decomposition, an electrostatic precip-
itator (ESP), and a flue gas desulfurization (FGD) system
with a wet scrubber and lime slurry for SOx removal.
Such facilities normally deal with the full stream of flue
gases. Fig. 1 shows the recently employed air pollution
controls at coal-fired power plants of the Japanese elec-
tric power industry at the end of 2000. Those plants are
exclusively used for electricity production. On the basis
of the electric power generation capacity, more than 80%
of the coal-fired power plants employ SCR, all plants are
398 S. Ito et al. / Science of the Total Environment 368 (2006) 397–402
NOx PM
FBC+DeNOx 2.4% Others 1.2%
Comb. control 3.1% Wet ESP
7.5%
LNB 13.7%
SCR 5.0% Extra cold ESP
23.1%
SCR+LNB
75.7% Hot ESP
17.1%
LNB: Low NOx burner, FBC: Fluidized bed combustion
On the basis of plant capacity, total 28.09GW
Fig. 1. Air pollution control of coal-fired power plant in Japan in 2000.
equipped with particulate control, and more than 96%
perform FGD mostly using wet scrubbers.
These flue gas treatments are also considered effec-
tive for emission control of trace elements, as well as
mercury. The electric power industry in Japan has
measured trace element concentrations in the coal
used in utility boilers and in the stack gases, voluntarily,
to comply with the notification of the Agency of Nat-
ural Resources and Energy, or to fulfill agreements with
local governments. Recently, the government imple-
mented a new law called the Pollutant Release and
Transfer Register (PRTR). The PRTR aims to promote
the voluntary improvement of business in the manage-
ment of specific chemical substances and to prevent any
impediment of environmental protection. Under this
Law, owners of business that deal with chemical sub-
stances in amounts exceeding stipulated values must
calculate the quantity of the substances they release into
the environment and notify the government of the
result. As for the trace elements in coal, As, B, Be,
Cd, Co, Cr, F, Hg, Mn, Mo, Ni, Pb, Sb, Se and V have
been designated in the PRTR. The amounts of those
elements treated in a coal-fired power plant were lower
than the reference quantities that the PRTR requires to
be reported. However, CRIEPI collected the data on
these elements from 10 electric utility companies and
the Electric Power Development Company (EPDC),
and analyzed the emissions into the atmosphere, except
for Mo for which the amount of data was very small.
The data of trace element concentrations in coal and
stack gases were obtained from modern coal-fired
power plants, all of which employed ESPs and wet
FGD using lime slurry; all but one employed SCR.
Using these emission data, the effect of coal-fired
power station emissions on the local atmospheric envi-
ronment was also investigated. Based on the calculation
of stack gas dispersion, the ground level concentrations
of trace elements due to diffusion were estimated and
compared with the background concentrations.
SOx
None 3.6%
In furnace DeSOx 2.4%
Wet scrubber (MgOH 2)
1.4%
Dry FGD (CaCO 3)
0.9%
Cold. ESP
51.1%
Wet scrubber (CaCO 3)
91.6%
2. Trace elements in coal
Nowadays all the coal consumed in Japan is
imported. In 2000, 59.9% of the total steam coal was
imported from Australia, 16.2% from China, 13.8%
from Indonesia, 3.6% from USA, and very small
amount from Canada and South Africa. The amount
of import varies year by year, but Australian coal
exceeds 50% normally and Chinese and Indonesian
coals follow it.
The data of trace element concentrations in coal
were collected from 13 power stations for 81 brands
of coal, most of which were bituminous coal. The
shipping countries of the coal were Australia (for 41
brands), USA (13), Canada (3), South Africa (10),
China (5), Indonesia (11) and Russia (3). Although
some brands of coal had plural set of data, individual
sets of data were treated independently, since the var-
iation in data for one brand exceeded the difference
between brands in some cases. As shown in Fig. 2, the
data seem to approximately follow the lognormal dis-
tribution. In the case of the lognormal distribution, the
geometric mean is generally selected as the represen-
tative quantity. However, it is lower than the arithmetic
mean and may cause underestimation when estimating
the total amount. Therefore Table 1 shows the arith-
metic means of the data as the representative values.
For mercury, the total number of datums was 181 and
the arithmetic mean was 0.045 mg/kg. Some coal
brands of China and South Africa showed higher
mercury concentrations with the maximum concentra-
tion of 0.21 mg/kg observed in this study. The con-
centration in coal may be rather affected by the degree
of coal cleaning and the product lot. The data of a
brand was limited and the variation in data for a brand
was sometimes higher than the difference between
brands, it was not possible to find the correlation
between mercury concentration distributions and the
coal origin.
 S. Ito et al. / Science of the Total Environment 368 (2006) 397–402 399

60 100% 45 100% 30 100% 60 100%

90% 40 90% 90% 90%

As Be B Cd
50 Number of datums 25 50
80% 80% 80% 80%
Cumulative 35
70% 70% 70% 70%

Number of datums [-]

Number of datums [-]
Number of datums [-]
Number of datums [-]

40 30 20 40

Cumulative (%)
Cumulative (%)

Cumulative (%)
Cumulative (%)
60% 60% 60% 60%
25
30 50% 50% 15 50% 30 50%
20
40% 40% 40% 40%
20 15 10 20
30% 30% 30% 30%
10 20%
20% 20% 20%
10 5 10
10% 5 10% 10% 10%

0 0% 0 0% 0 0% 0 0%
-3 -2
-1
-1
0
0
1
1
2
2
310
3
10
-1
-1
010
0
10
1
1
102
2
10
3
3
-1 -1
010 0 11 22 3 3 -3
10 -2
10 -110 -1 010 0 110 1
10 10 10 10 10 10 10 10
Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry]

15 100% 60 100% 60 100% 80 100%

90% 90% 90% 90%

Cr 70
Co 50 50 F Hg
80% 80% 80% 80%
60
70% 70% 70% 70%
Number of datums [-]

Number of datums [-]

Number of datums [-]

Number of datums [-]

10 40 40

Cumulative (%)

Cumulative (%)
Cumulative (%)

Cumulative (%)
60% 60% 50 60%
60%

50% 30 50% 30 50% 40 50%

40% 40% 40% 40%

30
5 20 20
30% 30% 30% 30%
20
20% 20% 20% 20%
10 10
10% 10
10% 10% 10%
0 0% 0 0% 0 0%
0 0%
-1 0 1 2 3 -1 -1 010 0 11 2 2 33 -1 0 1 2 3 -3 -2 -1 0 1
-1
10 010 1
10 2
10 3
10 10 10 10 10 -1
10 010 1
10 2
10 3
10 -3
10 -2
10 -1
10 010 110
Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry]

16 100% 20 100% 80 100% 12 100%

90% 18 90% 90% 90%

14 70 Pb
Mn Ni 10 Sb
80% 16 80% 80% 80%
12 60
70% 14 70% 70% 70%
Number of datums [-]
Number of datums [-]
Number of datums [-]

Number of datums [-]

8

Cumulative (%)
Cumulative (%)

Cumulative (%)

Cumulative (%)
10 50
60% 12 60% 60% 60%

8 50% 10 50% 40 50% 6 50%

40% 8 40% 40% 40%

6 30
4
30% 6 30% 30% 30%
4 20
20% 4 20% 20% 20%
2
2 10
10% 2 10% 10% 10%

0 0% 0 0% 0 0% 0 0%
-1 0 1 2 3 -1 0 1 2 3 -1 0 1 2 3 -2 -1 0 1 2
-1
10 010 1
10 2
10 3
10 -1
10 010 1
10 2
10 3
10 -1
10 0
10 1
10 2
10 3
10 -210 -110 010 110 210
Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry]

40 100% 40 100%

90% 90%
35 35
Se V
80% 80%
30 30
70% 70%
Number of datums [-]

Number of datums [-]

Cumulative (%)
Cumulative (%)

25 25
60% 60%

20 50% 20 50%

40% 40%
15 15
30% 30%
10 10
20% 20%
5 5
10% 10%

0 0% 0 0%
-2 -1 0 1 2 -1 0 1 2 3
10
-2 10
-1 10
0 10
1 10
2 -1
10 010 1
10 2
10 3
10
Concentration [mg/kg-dry] Concentration [mg/kg-dry]

Fig. 2. Trace element concentrations in coal used in coal-fired power plants in Japan.

Clarke and Sloss (1992) and Davidson and Clarke lands and gave 0.11 mg/kg as the mean concentration
(1996) showed the typical concentrations and the with the range 0.02 to 1.8 mg/kg. Kilgroe et al.
concentration range of trace elements in coal. Accord- (2002) summarized the mercury content in coal used
ing to them, the typical concentration of mercury was in coal-fired utility electric boilers in the US and
0.1 mg/kg and its range was from 0.02 to 1 mg/kg. showed that the mean concentration in bituminous
Meij et al. (2001) studied the content of mercury in coal was 0.11 mg /kg and the range was from 0.0
coal used in coal-fired power plants in the Nether- to 1.3 mg/kg.
400 S. Ito et al. / Science of the Total Environment 368 (2006) 397–402

Table 1 As shown in Table 2, the emission ratios of trace

Mean concentrations of trace elements in coal used in electric utility elements in particulate form are lower than 1%, but
coal-fired boilers in Japan (Dry base. 86 brands of coal. Data were
collected from 21 plants at 13 stations.)
fluorine, mercury and selenium, which exist partly as
vapor in stack gases, have higher emission ratios.
Mean concentration [mg/kg-dry] Number of datums
Boron may also exist partly in the vapor phase, but
As 1.97 180
gaseous boron was not measured. The highest emission
B 48.4 91
Be 2.07 131 ratio was found for mercury, which predominantly
Cd 0.231 180 exists as vapor in the stack gases. In general, mercury
Co 5.71 32 exists as particulate-bound mercury, gaseous oxidized
Cr 13.8 181 mercury such as mercury chloride, and gaseous elemen-
F 53.8 141
tal mercury, in combustion flue gases. In coal-fired
Hg 0.0454 181
Mn 37.1 59 power plants in Japan, particulate-bound mercury is
Ni 12.5 62 collected in the ESP and by wet FGD, gaseous oxidized
Pb 6.45 181 mercury is captured by wet FGD since it is water-
Sb 0.874 33 soluble, and gaseous elemental mercury penetrates
Se 0.833 123
into the stack gas as it is less adhesive and insoluble.
V 20.5 84
Therefore most of the mercury in the stack gas is
expected to be elemental mercury. Table 2 shows the
The data of trace elements in Table 1 were equal to mean mercury concentration in the stack gas to be 1.4
or lower than their typical and mean concentrations. Ag/m3N, the mean emission rate to be 4.4 Ag/kW h, and
This was probably due to the use of high quality coal in the mean emission ratio to be 27%. Coal properties,
utility companies aiming to reduce the emissions of
NOx , SOx and ash. Table 2
Mean values of trace element emissions into the atmosphere from
3. Trace element emissions from coal-fired power electric utility coal-fired power plants in Japan
plants C a [Ag/m3N] E a [Ag/kW h] R a (%) M a [t/y]
Mean na Mean n a Mean na
3.1. Emissions of trace elements As 0.487 100 1.74 69 0.560 30 0.251
B 0.471 33 2.21 18 0.0220 17 0.319
The data of trace element concentrations in stack Be 0.448 58 2.75 28 0.220 26 0.396
gases, the emission rates, and the emission ratios were Cd 0.0145 98 0.0487 67 0.733 28 0.00702
Co 0.0794 10 0.227 10 0.0193 10 0.0327
collected from 22 plants of 14 stations, 17 plants of 11
Cr 0.505 95 1.68 69 0.421 30 0.243
stations and 14 plants of 9 stations, respectively. The F
emission rate is the quantity emitted while producing Gas 601 72 2130 30 7.22 23 307
one unit of electricity, and the emission ratio is the Particulate 23.4 91 98.1 61 0.238 22 14.1
quantity of emission to the quantity in coal fed to the Totalb 624 2230 7.46 321
boiler. Since the amount of data from every plant was Hg
Gas 1.36 108 4.36 46 26.2 44 0.628
different, the data may be affected by the characteristics Particulate 0.0253 66 0.0707 66 0.921 25 0.0102
of the plant from which the data was obtained. How- Totalb 1.39 4.43 27.1 0.638
ever, the means of the data were regarded to be repre- Mn 1.36 52 3.88 52 0.0345 13 0.558
sentative of coal-fired power plants, because most coal- Ni 0.356 53 1.02 53 0.0498 16 0.147
fired power plants in Japan have similar configurations, Pb 0.938 97 3.60 69 0.417 30 0.518
Sb 0.0665 11 0.190 11 0.0595 11 0.0274
consisting of a pulverized coal combustion boiler, SCR, Se
ESP, and wet FGD. The data of concentrations, emis- Gas 2.50 25 7.30 25 5.51 25 1.05
sion rates and emission ratios seemed to follow the Particulate 1.85 92 5.83 62 2.31 24 0.840
lognormal distribution similarly to the concentrations Totalb 4.35 13.1 7.82 1.89
V 2.35 56 6.84 56 0.319 18 0.984
in coal, but Table 2 lists the arithmetic means to avoid
a
underestimation. The table also includes the estimated C=Stack gas concentration, E=Emission rate, R=Emission ratio,
M=Total annual emission, n=number of datums. Total annual emis-
total amounts of annual emissions calculated using the
sion was estimated on the basis of 1.44  1011 kW h which is the
emission rates and the total electricity from coal-fired total electricity from coal-fired power plants of 10 utility companies
power plants of the electric power industry in Japan in and EPDC in 2000.
b
2000. Gas + particulate. Other elements are particulate.
 S. Ito et al. / Science of the Total Environment 368 (2006) 397–402 401

Table 3
Proportions of trace elements in coal-fired power plant (%, 3 plants of 2 stations)
Clinka ESP FGDa Stack Total Number of datums
FGD (Gypsum and sludge) (Waste water)
As 1.9 67.2 4.3 4.26 0.02 1.6 75.0 9
Be 7.6 63.7 1.6 1.48 0.12 0.54 73.4 9
Cd 1.8 69.7 16.3 15.73 0.54 1.4 89.2 9
Cr 8.2 58.7 1.9 1.91 0.03 1.2 70.1 9
F 0.37 7.2 67.1 63.64 3.4 13.1 87.7 9
Hg 0.18 51.7 21.9 21.78 0.15 27.6 101.4 9
Ni 9.9 80.6 1.6 1.50 0.05 0.08 92.1 7
Pb 2.8 79.7 5.5 5.47 0.01 1.2 89.2 9
Sb 14.0 69.8 5.0 4.79 0.23 0.06 88.8 2
V 8.5 63.2 2.5 2.45 0.05 0.61 74.8 9
B, Co, Mn and Se were eliminated since mass balances were insufficient.
a
Wet scrubber. The numerical figure of FGD is the sum of (gypsum and sludge) and (waste water).

plant configurations and operation conditions are pos-
sibly the major factors affecting the emission character-
istics. However, they could not be discussed here
because of the incompleteness of the data set.
Meij et al. (2001) reported 3 Ag/m3N for the mean
stack concentration of mercury in Dutch coal-fired
power plants with high efficiency ESPs and wet FGD.
Kilgroe et al. (2002) showed various sets of data from
different kinds of US coal-fired power plants. The stack
concentration in Table 2 is lower than many of their
values but the mean emission ratio is almost the same as
the value of 25% reported by Meij et al. (2001). Kilgroe
et al. (2002) also obtained 25% for the pulverized coal
boilers with cold side ESPs and wet FDG using bitumi-
nous coal. The difference among stack gas concentra-
tions was probably due to the use of high quality coal in
the Japanese electric power industry. On the basis of the
emission rate, the total annual emission from the coal-
fired power plants of the Japanese electric power indus-
try was estimated to be 0.63 t/y in 2000 with some
degree of uncertainty. This quantity is less than the
emissions in many other countries, e.g., 72.9 t from
coal-fired power plants in China reported by Wang et
al. (2000), emission amounts from EU energy industries
reported in the Position paper (2001), and 48 t from US
coal-fired power plants reported by Kilgroe et al. (2002).
3.2. Proportions of trace elements
The proportions of trace elements in coal-fired power
plants are shown in Table 3. These values are the means
of a limited amount of data which varied depending on
factors such as the plant type and the type of coal. The
values in the table do not represent the average for coal-
fired power plants in Japan, but show the general trends.
The value in the column under bTotalQ is the sum of
proportions and the total values are distributed around
100%. To show the errors in mass balance, proportions
are not corrected to total 100%. Mercury evaporated
almost completely in the boiler and did not remain in
the clinker ash. When the temperature was decreased,
some mercury attached to fly ash particles and was
collected in the ESP. Some gaseous mercury was cap-
tured by FGD and was finally fixed in the gypsum and
sludge, with a very small quantity in the waste water.
The stack gas contained approximately one quarter of
the mercury in coal. Fluorine was also evaporated al-
most completely in the boiler. A small amount of fluo-
rine adhered to fly ash particles and the remainder was
removed by wet FGD. Arsenic and lead are volatile at
high temperatures, but were captured on fly ash particles
upstream of the ESP. Other elements existed in fly ash
particles and were also collected in the ESP.
4. Atmospheric environment loads of trace elements
from a coal-fired power station
To evaluate the effect of emissions during coal-fired
power generation on the local atmospheric environ-
ment, stack gas dispersion was calculated for a hypo-
thetical coal-fired power station consisting of two 1000
MW plants. Table 4 shows the operation conditions of
this plant. The calculation was performed using the
Table 4
Specifications of hypothetical coal-fired power station
Output 1000 MW  2
Coal consumption 360 t/h  2
Height of stack 200 m
Stack gas temperature 90 8C
Discharge velocity 30 m/s
Volume flow rate (wet) 3,400,000 m3N/h  2
Availability factor (annual) 83.9% (305 days/year)
402 S. Ito et al. / Science of the Total Environment 368 (2006) 397–402

Table 5 on the local atmospheric environment was evaluated to

Impact of trace element emission from hypothetical coal-fired power be very small.
station on the local environment (1000 MW  2 plants)
Maximum ground Background Ratio of
level concentration concentration concentrations 5. Conclusions
[ng/m3] [ng/m3] [ ]
As 1.46  10 3
2.0#1 7.3  10 4 To evaluate trace element emissions into the atmo-
B 1.85  10 3
NA – spheric environment from coal-fired power plants in
3
Be 2.31  10 0.072#1 3.2  10 2
Japan, trace element concentrations in coal and stack
5
Cd 4.08  10 1.4#2 3.0  10 5
gases, the emission rates, emission ratios and amounts
4
Co 1.90  10 0.26#2 7.3  10 4

Cr 1.41  10 3
7.4#1 1.9  10 4 of annual emissions were investigated.
F 1.87 NA – The concentrations in coal used in electric utility
Hg 3.71  10 3
2.6#1 1.4  10 3
coal-fired boilers in Japan were equal to or lower than
3
Mn 3.25  10 34#1 9.6  10 5
the typical concentrations generally reported, probably
4
Ni 8.57  10 6.4#1 1.3  10 4
due to the use of high quality coal. The concentrations
3
Pb 3.02  10 51#2 5.9  10 5

Sb 1.59  10 4
6.6#2 2.4  10
Se 1.10  10 2
1.1#2 9.8  10
V 5.73  10 3
4.6#2 1.2  10
#1: Local public entities in 2000, #2: National Atmospheric Monitor-
ing Stations in 1996.
plume and puff model specified in the manual of total
pollutant load control for nitrogen oxides by the Min-
istry of the Environment in Japan. Since the diameter
and density of particulates were not well known, the
effect of gravitational sedimentation, and the amounts
of dry and wet depositions were not considered. In a
modern coal-fired power plant, the average particle size
in the stack gas is often of the scale of sub-micrometer
to approximately a few micrometers. Hence the effect
of sedimentation is expected to be small. To obtain the
ground level concentrations, the dilution factor was
calculated and multiplied with the stack gas concentra-
tions calculated using the emission rates in Table 2 and
the volume flow rate of flue gas in Table 4. In the
calculation we used meteorological data and geograph-
ical data of an actual coal-fired power station where the
calculated maximum ground level concentration was
higher than those of other stations.
In Table 5, the maximum annual mean ground level
concentrations are compared with the annual average
background concentrations in Japan. The background
concentrations were the means of the data monitored by
local public entities in 2000 or at National Atmospheric
Monitoring Stations in 1996. Table 5 lacks the back-
ground concentrations of boron and fluorine since the
data were not obtained. As shown in the table, the ratios
of concentrations were between 3.2  10 2 for berylli-
um and 2.4  10 5 for antimony. For mercury, the
maximum ground level concentration was 3.7  10 3
ng/m3, which is 1.4  10 3 times the background con-
centration of 2.6 ng/m3. On the basis of these results,
the effect of emissions from the coal-fired power station
5 in stack gases and the emission ratio were also equal to
3 or lower than the data reported from other countries.
3
The use of air pollution control facilities in addition to
the use of high quality coal are thought to be effective
for reducing trace element emissions.
As to the proportion of trace elements in coal-fired
power plants, the particulate trace elements were col-
lected in an ESP and by wet FGD, and the emission
ratio was lower than 1%. To remove volatile elements,
wet FGD is effective, but these elements showed some-
what higher emission ratios than did the particulate
elements. Mercury had the highest emission ratio
among the trace elements in this study, with a fraction
of about 27%.
The calculation of stack gas dispersion yielded the
ground level concentrations of the trace elements emit-
ted from a hypothetical power station. The impact on
the local atmospheric environment of emissions from
the coal-fired power station was found to be small since
the maximum ground level concentrations of trace ele-
ments emitted from the station were much lower than
the background concentrations.
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