Sulphur Dioxide
Sulphur Dioxide (SO2) emissionsHistorical emission estimates for the United States are presented in Gschwandtner et al. (1985). The total country estimates are presented in several ways, per fuel type (bituminous coal, residual oil, other) and per source category (electric utilities, industrial, commercial, residential and other) for the period 1900 - 1980. Emission estimates per state are presented as totals. The U.S. National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program (NAPAP) presents extensive SO2 emission estimates for the United States in several reports. Placet (1991) concludes that during the period 1900 - 1970 the U.S. SO2-emission estimates increased by a factor of three, from 9 to 28 Tg. After enactment of the Clean Air Act in 1970 the sulphur emissions declined steadily, Placet (1991) estimated that during the period 1970 - 1988 the U.S. anthopogenic emissions of SO2 decreased with 27-29%. Husar (1994) stated the likely consensus of the long-term fluctuations included recessions, major wars, fuel switchting (e.g. within a country from mining regions with a different sulphur content of coal), and environmental concerns. There has also been a shift from manufacturing to power plants as the main emitters of sulphur. Another point of interest is the ongoing increase in recycling of fuel and ore-bound sulphur. Ayres (in Darmstadter et al. (1987)) presents trends of recovery rates. The recovery of sulphur from natural gas and zinc processing reaches almost a 100%, while the recovery from copper, lead ores, and oil products approaches 50%. Unfortunately, the sulphur recovery from coal that is responsible for most of the sulphur mobilization id still insignificant. Baumaffe (1987) presented SO2 emission estimates for 1980 and 1982 for most European OECD countries, for many source categories. A good reference for Europe (including former USSR) is the report of the EMEP programme for monitoring and evaluation of the long range transmission of air pollutants in Europe (Mylona, 1993; WRI, 1994). According to Ryaboshapko (1983) anthropogenic SO2 emissions have increased from less than 3 Tg S per year globally in 1860, 15 in 1900, 40 in 1940 and about 80 in 1980. Recently, a new very elaborate set of sulhpur dioxide emissions is presented by Lofohn et al. (1999). They used energy conmsumption data from CDIAC and territorial changes from Mitchell (1993, 1998) to compute historical sulphur emissions per country for the period 1850 - 1990. Source categories are Hard and Brown Coal, Oil and Smelting.
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