3 ms·

Its not a dirty secret, but just like the rules on chemicals under the organic certification, if you can show that there's no way to do what you want to do with

Its not a dirty secret, but just like the rules on chemicals under the organic certification, if you can show that there's no way to do what you want to do with lead-free, you can get an exemption. I suspect that "significantly lowers the cost of power generation" would outweigh "contains lead".

amatecha 3y ago
Yeah, I just mentioned in another comment that there already exist exemptions such as server/networking hardware: "Lead in solders for servers, storage and storage array systems, network infrastructure equipment for switching, signalling, transmission, and network management for telecommunications" ( https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A02011L0065-20230301#B-14 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A... )
kibwen 3y ago
> if you can show that there's no way to do what you want to do with lead-free The bar is even lower than that. For example, bullets are still made of lead, not because it's necessary, but because it's cheap, and despite the fact that it contaminates the meat of the hunted animal with lead.
- hollerith 3y ago
  Tangentially, the US Army has completely stopped using lead in bullets. Their 5.56 NATO ammo has copper where the lead used to be (i.e., inside a brass jacket) which reduces performance because copper is only 2/3 as dense as lead.
  - pnpnp 3y ago
    To be fair, the US Army puts a looooot of ammo in the ground, which can have pretty severe consequences. The consumer market still uses it, which is probably a tiny fraction of what the military uses in training.
  - kibwen 3y ago
    Copper bullets date back to the 80s, they're not a new development. Copper bullets have higher penetration despite having less mass, which makes them better against armored targets, and NATO still held on to lead for so long just because it's cheaper.
    - Tuna-Fish 3y ago
      They date back further than that. In WW1, French troops were mostly shooting full copper/bronze shot. The reason was that it was cheaper and easier to mass-produce solid copper bullets than it was to increase the production of jacketed bullets by a similar amount, and with Germany excluded from naval trade, there was suddenly a lot more copper available on the market.
  - hguant 3y ago
    Sorry, but this is entirely incorrect. First, terms - brass is not used to "jacket" a bullet. Brass is used as the case material for the cartridge. Steel, and nickel plated steel are some times also used here. "Jacketing" (as in, Full Metal Jacket) refers to the material that wraps around the exterior of the projectile. As far as I'm aware, the material used here is almost always copper, or a copper alloy (cupronickel). The US standard bullet is the M855. It's a lead core with a soft soft steel penetrator at the tip, that's jacketed with copper. There's an advanced version of the M855, the M855A1, which is an entirely steel slug, jacketed with copper. This bullet has better terminal performance at longer ranges, and slightly better armour piercing capabilities. The US army standard training round is the M193. It is a lead bullet jacketed with copper. Interestingly, it in many ways has better terminal performance than the M855 because this is the bullet the M16 and M4 rifles were designed around, and the M855 only exists because of NATO politics. There are no bullets in the US inventory, to my knowledge, that use a copper core. Copper is simply far too expensive to be used at that scale, and, as you pointed out, reduces the weight of the projectile which has negative effects on terminal performance. "Why are bullets jacketed in copper" you might be wondering here - when rifle cartridges were invented, they still used black powder, and all bullets were lead. When smokeless powder was invented, it became possible to have more explosive power per unit of volume. However, this had two negative effects - one, the lead projectile would either disintegrate, or became entirely inaccurate, at the speeds it was accelerated to. Second, the force of the bullet against the rifling of the barrel was rubbing away metal from the bullet, leaving lead deposits which fouled the gun and made it inaccurate. All steel bullets solved this problem, but increase the wear on the barrel. The solution was to coat (jacket) each bullet in a thin layer of copper, which was stiff enough to withstand the force of friction in air, while also softer than the steel barrel and reduced wear and tear on the rifles
    - georgewh 3y ago
      M855A1 is copper core. Lead free was a requirement as lead contamination from ranges was becoming a problem. See: https://www.army.mil/article-amp/106710/picatinny_ammo_goes_from_regular_to_unleaded https://www.army.mil/article-amp/106710/picatinny_ammo_goes_...
    - hollerith 3y ago

amatecha 3y ago

Yeah, I just mentioned in another comment that there already exist exemptions such as server/networking hardware: "Lead in solders for servers, storage and storage array systems, network infrastructure equipment for switching, signalling, transmission, and network management for telecommunications" ( https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A02011L0065-20230301#B-14 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A... )

kibwen 3y ago

> if you can show that there's no way to do what you want to do with lead-free The bar is even lower than that. For example, bullets are still made of lead, not because it's necessary, but because it's cheap, and despite the fact that it contaminates the meat of the hunted animal with lead.

hollerith 3y ago
Tangentially, the US Army has completely stopped using lead in bullets. Their 5.56 NATO ammo has copper where the lead used to be (i.e., inside a brass jacket) which reduces performance because copper is only 2/3 as dense as lead.
- pnpnp 3y ago
  To be fair, the US Army puts a looooot of ammo in the ground, which can have pretty severe consequences. The consumer market still uses it, which is probably a tiny fraction of what the military uses in training.
- kibwen 3y ago
  Copper bullets date back to the 80s, they're not a new development. Copper bullets have higher penetration despite having less mass, which makes them better against armored targets, and NATO still held on to lead for so long just because it's cheaper.
  - Tuna-Fish 3y ago
    They date back further than that. In WW1, French troops were mostly shooting full copper/bronze shot. The reason was that it was cheaper and easier to mass-produce solid copper bullets than it was to increase the production of jacketed bullets by a similar amount, and with Germany excluded from naval trade, there was suddenly a lot more copper available on the market.
- hguant 3y ago
  Sorry, but this is entirely incorrect. First, terms - brass is not used to "jacket" a bullet. Brass is used as the case material for the cartridge. Steel, and nickel plated steel are some times also used here. "Jacketing" (as in, Full Metal Jacket) refers to the material that wraps around the exterior of the projectile. As far as I'm aware, the material used here is almost always copper, or a copper alloy (cupronickel). The US standard bullet is the M855. It's a lead core with a soft soft steel penetrator at the tip, that's jacketed with copper. There's an advanced version of the M855, the M855A1, which is an entirely steel slug, jacketed with copper. This bullet has better terminal performance at longer ranges, and slightly better armour piercing capabilities. The US army standard training round is the M193. It is a lead bullet jacketed with copper. Interestingly, it in many ways has better terminal performance than the M855 because this is the bullet the M16 and M4 rifles were designed around, and the M855 only exists because of NATO politics. There are no bullets in the US inventory, to my knowledge, that use a copper core. Copper is simply far too expensive to be used at that scale, and, as you pointed out, reduces the weight of the projectile which has negative effects on terminal performance. "Why are bullets jacketed in copper" you might be wondering here - when rifle cartridges were invented, they still used black powder, and all bullets were lead. When smokeless powder was invented, it became possible to have more explosive power per unit of volume. However, this had two negative effects - one, the lead projectile would either disintegrate, or became entirely inaccurate, at the speeds it was accelerated to. Second, the force of the bullet against the rifling of the barrel was rubbing away metal from the bullet, leaving lead deposits which fouled the gun and made it inaccurate. All steel bullets solved this problem, but increase the wear on the barrel. The solution was to coat (jacket) each bullet in a thin layer of copper, which was stiff enough to withstand the force of friction in air, while also softer than the steel barrel and reduced wear and tear on the rifles
  - georgewh 3y ago
    M855A1 is copper core. Lead free was a requirement as lead contamination from ranges was becoming a problem. See: https://www.army.mil/article-amp/106710/picatinny_ammo_goes_from_regular_to_unleaded https://www.army.mil/article-amp/106710/picatinny_ammo_goes_...
  - hollerith 3y ago