Mercury

1. What is mercury?

• 1.1 In what forms does mercury exist?
• 1.2 How does mercury exist in the environment?
• 1.3 How can the form of mercury affect living organisms and the environment?

1.1 In what forms does mercury exist?

The source document for this Digest states:

Mercury occurs naturally in the environment and exists in a large number of forms. Like lead or cadmium, mercury is a constituent element of the earth, a heavy metal. In pure form, it is known alternatively as "elemental" or "metallic" mercury (also expressed as Hg(0) or Hg⁰). Mercury is rarely found in nature as the pure, liquid metal, but rather within compounds and inorganic salts. Mercury can be bound to other compounds as monovalent or divalent mercury (also expressed as Hg(I) and Hg(II) or Hg²⁺, respectively). Many inorganic and organic compounds of mercury can be formed from Hg(II).

Elemental mercury is a shiny, silver-white metal that is a liquid at room temperature and is traditionally used in thermometers and some electrical switches. If not enclosed, at room temperature some of the metallic mercury will evaporate and form mercury vapours. Mercury vapours are colourless and odourless. The higher the temperature, the more vapours will be released from liquid metallic mercury. Some people who have breathed mercury vapours report a metallic taste in their mouths.

Mercury is mined as mercuric sulphide (cinnabar ore). Through history, deposits of cinnabar have been the source ores for commercial mining of metallic mercury. The metallic form is refined from mercuric sulphide ore by heating the ore to temperatures above 540º C. This vaporises the mercury in the ore, and the vapours are then captured and cooled to form the liquid metal mercury.

Inorganic mercuric compounds include mercuric sulphide (HgS), mercuric oxide (HgO) and mercuric chloride (HgCl₂). These mercury compounds are also called mercury salts. Most inorganic mercury compounds are white powders or crystals, except for mercuric sulphide, which is red and turns black after exposure to light. Some mercury salts (such as HgCl₂) are sufficiently volatile to exist as an atmospheric gas. However, the water solubility and chemical reactivity of these inorganic (or divalent) mercury gases lead to much more rapid deposition from the atmosphere than for elemental mercury. This results in significantly shorter atmospheric lifetimes for these divalent mercury gases than for the elemental mercury gas.

When mercury combines with carbon, the compounds formed are called "organic" mercury compounds or organomercurials. There is a potentially large number of organic mercury compounds (such as dimethylmercury, phenylmercury, ethylmercury and methylmercury); however, by far the most common organic mercury compound in the environment is methylmercury. Like the inorganic mercuric compounds, both methylmercury and phenylmercury exist as "salts" (for example, methylmercuric chloride or phenylmercuric acetate). When pure, most forms of methylmercury and phenylmercury are white crystalline solids. Dimethylmercury, however, is a colourless liquid.

Source & ©: UNEP Global Mercury Assessment report, Summary of the Report, 
Chapter 2, paragraphs 39 to 43

For more information, see Chapter 2: Chemistry 

1.2 How does mercury exist in the environment?

The source document for this Digest states:

Several forms of mercury occur naturally in the environment. The most common natural forms of mercury found in the environment are metallic mercury, mercuric sulphide, mercuric chloride, and methylmercury. Some micro-organisms and natural processes can change the mercury in the environment from one form to another.

Elemental mercury in the atmosphere can undergo transformation into inorganic mercury forms, providing a significant pathway for deposition of emitted elemental mercury.

The most common organic mercury compound that micro-organisms and natural processes generate from other forms is methylmercury. Methylmercury is of particular concern because it can build up (bioaccumulate and biomagnify) in many edible freshwater and saltwater fish and marine mammals to levels that are many thousands of times greater than levels in the surrounding water.

Being an element, mercury cannot be broken down or degraded into harmless substances. Mercury may change between different states and species in its cycle, but its simplest form is elemental mercury, which itself is harmful to humans and the environment. Once mercury has been liberated from either ores or from fossil fuel and mineral deposits hidden in the earth’s crust and released into the biosphere, it can be highly mobile, cycling between the earth’s surface and the atmosphere. The earth’s surface soils, water bodies and bottom sediments are thought to be the primary biospheric sinks for mercury.

Source & ©: UNEP Global Mercury Assessment report, Summary of the Report, 
Chapter 2, paragraphs 44 to 46 and 48

For more information, see Chapter 2: Chemistry 

1.3 How can the form of mercury affect living organisms and the environment?

The source document for this Digest states:

The different forms mercury exists in (such as elemental mercury vapour, methylmercury or mercuric chloride) are commonly designated "species". As mentioned above, the main groups of mercury species are elemental mercury, inorganic and organic mercury forms. Speciation is the term commonly used to represent the distribution of a quantity of mercury among various species.

Speciation plays an important part in the toxicity and exposure of mercury to living organisms. Among other things, the species influence:

• The physical availability for exposure - if mercury is tightly bound to in-absorbable material, it cannot be readily taken up (e.g. into the blood stream of the organism);
• The internal transport inside the organism to the tissue on which it has toxic effects - for example the crossing of the intestinal membrane or the blood-brain barrier;
• Its toxicity (partly due to the above mentioned);
• Its accumulation, bio-modification, detoxification in – and excretion from – the tissues;
• Its bio-magnification on its way up the trophic levels of the food chain (an important feature particularly for methylmercury).

Speciation also influences the transport of mercury within and between environmental compartments including the atmosphere and oceans, among others. For example, the speciation is a determining factor for how far from the source mercury emitted to air is transported. Mercury adsorbed on particles and ionic (e.g. divalent) mercury compounds will fall on land and water mainly in the vicinity of the sources (local to regional distances), while elemental mercury vapour is transported on a hemispherical/global scale making mercury emissions a global concern. Another example is the so-called "polar sunrise mercury depletion incidence", where the transformation of elemental mercury to divalent mercury is influenced by increased solar activity and the presence of ice crystals, resulting in a substantial increase in mercury deposition during a three month period (approximately March to June).

Moreover, speciation is very important for the controllability of mercury emissions to air. For example, emissions of inorganic mercuric compounds (such as mercuric chloride) are captured reasonably well by some control devices (such as wet-scrubbers), while capture of elemental mercury tends to be low for most emission control devices.

Source & ©: UNEP Global Mercury Assessment report, Summary of the Report, 
Chapter 2, paragraphs 49 to 52

For more information, see Chapter 2: Chemistry