Swedish researchers have discovered that nature heals itself: Dangerous levels of mercury in their aquatic ecosystems are correcting themselves

Natural News: Mercury is listed as one of the top 10 chemical concerns for public health, as per the World Health Organization (WHO). Over half of Swedish lakes have very high mercury levels, and eating fish from these bodies of water can pose a threat to people’s health and wildlife. The matter seems hopeless, but results from a recent study look promising since this problem could soon be blown away by the wind.

Kevin Bishop, from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) and one of the researchers in the Swedish-Chinese-Swiss team behind the study, explains: “Our research shows that Swedish freshwater fish might be on their way to becoming safe to eat in decades with current mercury pollution control measures, rather than in centuries as was previously believed.”

The team of researchers from SLU spent at least ten years developing “a sensitive technique to measure the movements of mercury gas between the atmosphere and landscape,” and now they have published the first annual mass balance of mercury inputs and outputs for a peatland. Aside from the major technical accomplishment of successfully measuring mercury gas going into or out of the peatland 10 times a second for a year, the result of the mass balance is also exceptional.

Mats Nilsson from SLU explained that in the first full year of measurements on a peatland, they determined that it loses twice as much mercury gas back to the atmosphere that is being deposited on the peatland by rainfall. This is a significant update because it implies that the latest reductions in atmospheric mercury concentrations, with at least a 50 percent decrease in the last 20 years, have somehow “reversed the direction of mercury flows between the atmosphere and the peatland.” ...read more>>...