Rob gave a remote presentation at the OESG meeting in Japan in March 2025 as part of the group’s Integrative Assessment (IA) activities. His presentation focused on the potential for IA of the ocean abiotic and biotic compartments and the impact of the MCM on human exposure.
Rob is a member of the Open Ended Science Group (OESG) that is working with the UNEP Minamata Convention on Mercury (MCM) to assess the effectiveness of the convention to date – the so-called :Effectiveness Evaluation”. Rob is working with the ocean group and also with the groups working on modeling oceans and the atmosphere and their interactions.
Rob was a member of the Executive Committee for the 16th Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant that took place in Cape Town, South Africa because of COVID in July 2024. Rob was the lead organizer of the student judging and other activities at the meeting.
SEAmester 2023. Rob Mason participates in the South African oceanographic teaching and research cruise on the R/V Agulhas in the Indian Ocean in June 2023. https://seamester.co.za/?doing_wp_cron=1690905504.5788450241088867187500
Rob was a member of the Executive Committee for the 15th Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant that took place remotely because of COVID in July 2022.
Mason, R.P. 2021. Mercury and Sea Ice: Understanding the role of climate change on mercury levels in the Arctic Ocean. Presentation made from ship to the Strait Talk Science Series, organized for indigenous communities in the Arctic. June 2021.
Rob is a member of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment (AMAP) in 2021: Mercury in the Arctic.
https://www.amap.no/documents/doc/amap-assessment-2021-mercury-in-the-arctic/3581.
Rob had a Fulbright Scholarship to perform research on the effects of mercury use in goldmining, with additional training and capacity building in West Africa with visits to Cote d’Ivoire in summer 2017 and 2019 and to Burkina Faso in 2018.
Rob was a member of the Science Steering Committee for the 14th Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant that took place in Krakow in Sept 2019.
United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP). Rob was one of the co-authors of the revised UNEP Minamata Convention 2018 Technical Report, which will be published in summer 2018. One chapter from the report has been turned into a policy paper for publication in ES&T.
Rob was a member of the Executive Committee for the 13th Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant (ICMGP) which will took place in Providence, Rhode Island in July 2017.
Rob participated as the Moderator for a Plenary Panel for the 12th ICMGP in Jeju island, Korea in 2015 on Stable Mercury Isotopes. He also edited, with Holger Hintelmann, a Special Issue of Elementa associated with the plenary and related talks.
United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP). Rob was one of the co-authors of the UNEP Minamata Convention 2013 Technical Report which was published in conjunction with the launch of the Minamata Convention on Mercury. He contributed primarily to the chapter on Aquatic pathways, transport and fate. The report is planned for an update in 2016 and Rob again will be a co-author.
Rob has also contributed in the past to the UNEP Mercury Air Transport and Fate Research Partnership, in particular the Mercury chapter in the UNECE’s report for the Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution Task force. He also co-edited a book with Nicole Pirrone – Pirrone, N. and Mason, R.P. (2009). Mercury Fate and Transport in the Global Atmosphere: Emissions, Measurements and Models (Pirrone, N., and Mason, R., Eds.) Springer, New York: ISBN: 978-0-387-93957-5, pp.1- 637.
Rob was a co-author of a publication commenting on EPA’s regulation of the utility industry published in ES&T More
Rob was a co-author on a publication discussing the need for improved techniques for evaluating the atmospheric speciation of mercury. More.
Rob was a co-author of a recent paper discussing the sources of mercury to ocean fish (Chen, C. Y., Driscoll, C. T., Lambert, K. F., Mason, R., Sunderland, E. M. 2016. Connecting mercury science to policy: from sources to seafood. Reviews on Environmental Health 31: 17-20).
Rob published a book in 2013 titled Trace Metals in Aquatic Systems More
Rob was a Member, Coastal and Marine Mercury Ecosystem Research Collaborative (CMERC) Organizational Committee. 2010-2012. CMERC through meetings of scientists coordinated the publication of a Special Issue in Environmental Pollution on mercury in marine ecosystems. He participated in the production of a report that was written for managers and the public, and an associated 11 minute movie, both title “Mercury: From sources to seafood”. He visited Washington DC with others to promote mercury issues to Federal Agencies and on the hill. There were other publications from this effort (Evers et al. 2008) and Chen et al. (2008)).
Rob was a Member of Working Group 37 (Expanded scientific review of mercury and its compounds and their threats to the marine environment) for the international Group of Experts on the Scientific Aspects of Marine Environmental Pollution (GESAMP). Details.
Rob was a Member of the National Mercury Monitoring Workshop Steering Committee, Washington, DC that was involved in trying to get legislation approved to have a national mercury monitoring network (MercNet). These activities led to the publication of a book focused on the specifics of large scale mercury monitoring (Ecosystem Responses to Mercury Contamination), and several papers (Mason et al. (2005) and Smeltz et al. (2011)) and a book chapter.
