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Recycling and Steel Industries Team Up With Environmental Organizations to Eliminate Mercury Switches in Autos

Groups Create National Partnership for Mercury-Free Vehicles

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE January 30, 2002
Contacts: Janet B. Kreizman, 202-662-8527 e-mail: janetkreizman@isri.org Gregory Button, 734-761-3186, x113 gregoryb@ecocenter.org

AUGUSTA, MAINE -- At the State House today, a broad national coalition voiced its support for legislation in Maine aimed at removing mercury-added components from automobiles. Representatives of the Partnership for Mercury-Free Vehicles, a newly formed coalition representing all of the industries involved in the recycling of vehicles as well as state and national environmental groups, testified in favor of the bill (LD 1921) at today's public hearing before the Natural Resources Committee.

The bill, sponsored by Sen. John Martin (D-Eagle Lake), seeks to create a system for removing and disposing of mercury-added components, mercury switches used in trunk and hood lights and in antilock brake systems, from vehicles that are to be recycled. Further, the bill calls on auto manufacturers to take responsibility for establishing a system for collecting and consolidating these mercury components for recycling.

"We in the recycling industry have long been very concerned about the continued use of potentially hazardous materials, such as mercury, in the design and manufacture of automobiles," said Robin K. Wiener, President of the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI), "and we strongly support this bill in Maine. If enacted, it removes from the recycling equation a known public health hazard and helps to ensure that manufacturers share in the responsibility for solving a problem created by their decision to use mercury in automobiles."

Other members of the Partnership for Mercury - Free Vehicles, including the rest of the industries in the vehicle recycling chain - the automotive dismantling industry and the nation's steel mills - also testified in favor of LD 1921.

Bill Heenan, President of the Steel Recycling Institute, said, "With Steel being America's most recycled material, and the engine that drives the recycling of America's most recycled product, the automobile, it is imperative that we protect this infrastructure from contaminants." He continued, "Therefore the steel industry is totally supportive of the removal of mercury switches prior to shredding and, if this cannot be guaranteed, our members will be forced to stop consuming shredded scrap which will in effect destroy the best recycling infrastructure in America - the recycling of automobiles."

Because of the risks from mercury in Maine's lakes, the state Bureau of Health warns pregnant women, women who may get pregnant, and children under age eight not to eat most kinds of freshwater fish.

"This legislation would go a long way toward eliminating a key source of mercury to our environment," said Charles Griffith, Auto Project Director of the Ecology Center, and representative of the national Clean Car Campaign. "Maine can set the tone for the rest of the nation by establishing a unique program that gets manufacturers of mercury - added products to assist in the recovery of such products."

The members of the Partnership for Mercury - Free Vehicles are: Automotive Recyclers Association, Clean Car Campaign, Clean Production Network, Ecology Center, Environmental Defense, Great Lakes United, Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, Inc., Mercury Policy Project, Steel Manufacturers Association, and the Steel Recycling Institute.