Providence – Today Clean Water Action released a report documenting that Rhode Island is below the national average for preventing mercury pollution from thermostats and far behind the national leaders. The report, Turning Up The Heat, also finds that thermostat makers have collected less than 5% of the thermostats coming out of service over the last 10 years. The House Committee on Environment and Natural Resources is scheduled to hear a bill that would prevent mercury pollution from thermostats on Thursday, February 4 at the rise of the House in room 205.

“The Rhode Island general assembly has banned the sale of mercury thermostats since 2006 in order to prevent mercury pollution, but taking these toxic products off the market is only part of the solution” said Chairman Jan Malik of the House Committee on Environment and Natural Resources. “Now we need to take the next step to make sure we safely dispose of the mercury from the hundreds of thousands of thermostats in Rhode Island homes and businesses.”

In 1998, the “Big 3” thermostat manufacturers, Honeywell, General Electric Co., and White- Rodgers, created the Thermostat Recycling Corporation (TRC) to voluntarily collect and recycle used thermostats. However, over a decade into the program, TRC still collects only a small fraction of the thermostats coming out of service. From 1999 to 2008, the EPA conservatively estimated that 70-100 tons of mercury came from out of service mercury thermostats, but TRC collected less than 4 tons, under 5% of the mercury. TRC’s annual report shows that their collection program in Rhode Island is even falling below the low national average.

Clean Water Action supports Chairman Malik’s bill, the Mercury Thermostat Pollution Prevent Act (H7199), which calls for manufacturers to pay for the collection and recycling of mercury thermostats – similar to RI’s e-waste law. Last year, strong majorities in both the House and Senate of the Rhode Island General Assembly supported the initiative, but the bill failed to be scheduled for a final vote on the last day of the October special session. Sen. Dominick Ruggerio will introduce the Senate companion bill soon.

“The industry’s voluntary recycling program is failing Rhode Islanders,” said Sheila Dormody, Rhode Island director of Clean Water Action. “Mercury poses a serious, but preventable pollution problem, so Rhode Island legislators need to create a serious collection and recycling program.”

In 2006, Maine enacted the nation’s first comprehensive mercury thermostat collection law and has the highest per capita mercury thermostat collection rate in the country. Among other requirements, the law obliges thermostat manufacturers to collect mercury thermostats, provide a $5 financial incentive to encourage recycling, and meet meaningful performance standards for measuring progress. As a result, the Maine program collects ten times the national per capita average of state programs.

"Rhode Island has flagged advisories about mercury contamination of fish in Rhode Island ponds, indicating that mercury in the food chain is still a concern," said Eugenia Marks, Senior Director of Policy for the Audubon Society of Rhode Island. "Rhode Island’s inadequate disposal of mercury thermostats contributes to the air deposition of mercury to ponds throughout New England."

Key Findings

• Each mercury thermostat contains about 4 grams of mercury (about 800 times more mercury than a CFL light bulb).
  
• Mercury thermostats are a significant source of preventable mercury pollution. The U.S. EPA conservatively estimated that 2-3 million thermostats come out of service each year nationally, amounting to 7-10 tons of mercury annually.
• From 1999 to 2008, TRC collected less than 5% of the amount of mercury the EPA estimated came out of service.
  
• On a per capita basis, Maine’s mandatory program, which includes financial incentives, captures over 12 times more mercury per year than the current Rhode Island collection program.
  
• On an encouraging note, the report also found that state laws banning the sale of mercury thermostats have dramatically reduced the amount of mercury used in manufacturing. Since 2001, mercury use in U.S. thermostat manufacturing has been reduced by 73%. Rhode Island was the first of 15 states to ban the sale of mercury thermostats. 

Background

Tens of millions of mercury thermostats containing several hundred tons of mercury are still in use in U.S. homes and businesses. The mercury in a thermostat will pollute the air, land or water if not managed properly at the end of its useful life. Given that thermostats can last for decades, the vast reservoir of mercury currently on the walls in homes will be making its way into landfills and incinerators for years to come — unless effective collection programs are developed.
The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that between 300,000 and 630,000 infants are born in the United States each year with mercury levels that are associated with the loss of IQ. Twenty-seven states have statewide advisories for all their fresh water lakes and rivers, and 13 states have statewide advisories for all their coastal waters due to mercury pollution. The Rhode Island Department of Health warns that children and pregnant women should not eat any freshwater fish caught in Rhode Island due to mercury pollution.

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