'Green Bullets' Overtaking Lead Thanks to EPA, State Regs, Military

'Green Bullets' Overtaking Lead Thanks to EPA, State Regs, Military 7 Breitbart 35min  //  keep unread  //  hide  //  preview   +TAG Thanks to EPA regulations, state regulations, and military goals, traditional lead ammo is on its way out and "green bullets" are on their way in. As Breitbart News reported on December 1, EPA regulations led to the closing of the Herculaneam lead smelter in Herculaneum, Missouri, which is expected to push up prices for traditional lead ammo. On top of this are regulations like the recent statewide lead ammo ban in California.Signed by Governor Jerry Brown (D) on October 11, this ban forces hunters to seek out nontraditional alternatives for their ammunition. In this way, the ban mandates "green bullets" by default. Moreover, as Fox News reports, the military has set 2018 as its target date to have troops operating lead-ammo-free. "Green bullets" have been under testing at Picatinny Arsenal since 2010, and the Army plans to issue "a lead-free version of the 7.62 mm rounds fired from M-14 rifles... in 2014." The Army already switched to a greener 5.56 mm "enhanced performance round" in 2010. With the military committing to the switch, the EPA making smelting a tougher business, and governors passing state-level lead ammo bans, experts say "lead bullets will be all but phased out within a few years in favor of so-called green bullets."  Does the new ammo perform as well as the old? That is one question that has yet to be answered. Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter @AWRHawkins. Green Bullets Not So Eco-Friendly bullets ammunition  CBS/AP Comment     Shares     Tweets     Stumble     Email More + Army officials at Camp Edwards believed they were being eco-friendly when they started using a "green bullet" that contains no lead — a move meant to prevent polluting an aquifer beneath the base. But six years later, after a million rounds have been fired at the base's shooting ranges, new information suggests the green bullets may not be much better for the environment than the lead ones. "It's frustrating," Col. William FitzPatrick of the National Guard's Environmental Readiness Center said Thursday. "You're doing what you think are the right things. As science evolves, you wonder, 'Am I in front of the curve, or behind?"' The green bullets are made of nylon and tungsten, a metal that supposedly does not seep into ground as quickly as lead. That's important because the aquifer below the base supplies upper Cape Cod with drinking water. But conventional wisdom about tungsten has been challenged by tests done in recent years at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, N.J. Lab tests there found in 2002 that tungsten was not insoluble and that it could travel through soil under certain conditions. It also found that tungsten enables lead to move through the soil more quickly. The Army has now begun field tests on how tungsten moves through the ground. Camp Edwards is part of the Massachusetts Military Reservation, which covers 30 square miles. It's been a major training center for decades. The camp has had a history of environmental problems since it opened in 1911. Jet fuel, solvents and other pollutants contaminated the aquifer and the groundwater is now under constant monitoring. In 1997, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ordered target practice halted at the camp and ordered a clean-up of lead buried in and around the berms at the base shooting ranges. Lead was later found 19 feet underground and moving toward the aquifer — though it never reached the water. For now, the tungsten bullets are still officially considered safe by the Department of Defense, and they are still used at the base. © 2005 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.