The logic seemed reasonable. Removing lead from petrol (where it was used
to
prevent engine mistiming) brought clear environmental and health benefits,
taking a harmful chemical that can affect intelligence out of the
atmosphere. Removing lead from solder, the 37% lead, 63% tin alloy used to
join metal objects in everything from plumbing to circuit boards, was an
obvious next step to prevent it leaching into ground water from dumped
items
in landfills.

Meanwhile, the US and Japan have also been moving to lead-free solders.
It's
a huge shift; the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that
80m kilograms of lead solder was used worldwide in 2002.


Isn't it funny how figures can be 'distorted' to make facts suit the
context. By saying "80m kilos", the EPA make it sound like a HUGE amount,
but put that into a more 'recognisable' form, and it becomes 80 thousand
tonnes, which is not nearly so contentious. Then further, take that only 37%
of that was actually lead, and you are down to 29.6 thousand tonnes. Now
compare that to the world's lead-acid battery usage, where recycling of the
end-of-life product to recover the lead, has been sucessfully in place for
years. At 30th tonnes, the potential environmental impact of the lead in
solder, even if you *did* dump it all in the ground, is minuscule.

As I've said before, I'm glad that the avionics industry refuse to use the
stuff. The day they do is the day I stop flying ...

Arfa