Estimating the natural background atmospheric deposition rate of mercury utilizing ombrotrophic bogs in southern Sweden

A critical gap in the understanding of the global cycling of mercury is the limited data describing the natural background atmospheric deposition rate of mercury before the advent of pollution. Existing estimates of the natural deposition rate are typically about 2-5 mug of Hg m(-2) year(-1) (see, for example, Swain et al. Science 1992, 257, 784-787), based on studies that generally rely on short, Pb-210-dated lake sediment and peat cores that span the past 150 years. Analyses of mercury in long peat cores in southcentral Sweden indicate that natural mercury deposition rates in the period 4000-500 BP were lower, about 0.5-1 mug of Hg m(-2) year(-1). This suggests that recent mercury accumulation rates in the peat (15-25 mug of Hg m(-2) year(-1)) and measured atmospheric deposition rates of mercury in Sweden over the past 3 decades (5-30 mug of Hg m(-2) year(-1)) (Munthe et al. Water, Air, Soil Pollut: Focus 2001, 1, 299-310) are at least an order of magnitude greater than the prepollution deposition rate, rather than representing only a 3-5-fold increase, as has generally been estimated.