TF HTAP Workshops on Hg and POPs Trends and Source Attribution

Two scientific workshops on Hg and POPs were jointly organized by Meteorological Synthesizing Center-East (MSC-E) and the Task Force on Hemispheric Transport of Air Pollution (TF HTAP) in April 2021. The workshops were aimed at development of a program of future Hg and POP activities within TF HTAP. They were particularly focused on (i) anticipating assessment needs of the LRTAP, Minamata, and Stockholm Conventions; (ii) reviewing progress made in other forums, including recent AMAP assessments; (iii) identifying cooperative activities that can be undertaken in the short term (2 years) and longer term (4-5 years) to improve our understanding and ability to estimate Hg and POPs pollution levels, trends and source attribution.   Read more…

Cooperation with maritime conventions (OSPAR, HELCOM)

MSC-E continued cooperation with the OSPAR and HELCOM marine conventions. OSPAR is focused on protection of the marine environment of the North-East Atlantic. HELCOM was established to protect environment of the Baltic Sea area.  It is planned to evaluate atmospheric loads of heavy metals (Pb, Cd, Hg, Cu) and POPs (HCB, PBDE) long-term trends of atmospheric pollution and source attribution for the OSPAR regions of the North-East Atlantic and for the Baltic Sea and its sub-basins. It is important to note that long-range trends of atmospheric loads of the second priority metals (Cu) to the Baltic Sea will be assessed for the first time.