Overall, the program is considered a modest success, with the state Department of Environmental Protection estimating that 20 percent to 30 percent of all switches are now accounted for, said John James of the department's Waste Management Bureau.
The switches - tiny vials of metal or glass containing a single bead of mercury - were used in lighting, seat belts and anti-lock braking systems before the advent of electronic sensors. As the only metal to be a liquid in its natural state, mercury possessed the ability to flow with gravity, completing an electronic circuit that could, for example, turn on a light automatically when a vehicle's trunk was raised.
The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, which represents nine major firms, began phasing out mercury in 1995 and pledged that no new car manufactured after Jan. 1, 2003, would use the switches. Other automakers have made a similar switch to computer circuitry.
But hundreds of thousands of late-model cars and trucks using mercury switches remain on the road. And as these vehicles wear out, that mercury must be accounted for, environmentalists have argued.
Otherwise, worn-out vehicles would be gutted for parts, crushed, and sent to steel recycling facilities - most of which are concentrated in New Jersey - with the mercury switches intact. As a result, the mercury would continue to be emitted from the smelters' smokestacks.
According to The Clean Car Campaign, a Michigan-based environmental group, 18,000 pounds of mercury was released into the air nationwide last year as cars were melted down.
And since the New York metropolitan area is a major source of air pollution that drifts northeast on the prevailing winds, most of the East Coast mercury ends up in New England lakes and streams, where it can contaminate fish flesh.
Mercury is a neurotoxin that scientists have linked to birth defects and learning disabilities, and to cancers and heart disease in adults.
"The fact is, [the mercury] blows back to Maine," James said.
Maine legislators created the recycling program in 2002, asking junkyards to remove the switches, then charging auto manufacturers a dollar per switch bounty to fund the program. The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers unsuccessfully challenged the law in court, arguing that it was a burden on interstate trade, but has since complied.
However, some automakers have been testifying in New Jersey and Minnesota, other states considering following Maine's lead, saying that the collection program is a failure because only 2,417 switches have been turned in for the bounty.
NRCM responded by surveying approximately 100 auto salvage shops this fall, and learned that, in fact, more than 16,000 have been collected. NRCM spokesman Jon Hinck believes that all the major shops were contacted, but that many more switches could have been collected, a few at a time, by small businesses in rural Maine.
Under state law, shops have three years and can collect more than 4,000 of the tiny switches before they are required to turn them in to Westco Distribution - the Bangor- and Portland-based hazardous waste firm that holds the contract to handle the switches through the close of 2005. In Bangor, Westco had collected 2,435 switches as of Monday, according to spokesman Jim Baines.
Many facilities told NRCM they didn't want to go to the trouble of collecting the bounty - as automakers have required detailed records, including the vehicle identification number, for each car a switch is removed from.
Some said they recycled the switches anyway because it was "the right thing to do," Hinck said.
Others argued that they couldn't afford to participate.
"The program isn't designed so that auto recyclers in Maine can profiteer, but ... I'm really quite convinced that nobody comes close to breaking even on $1 a switch," Hinck said.
In fact, 70 percent of those surveyed said that the bounty should be increased.
DEP agrees, and has submitted a bill for consideration by the 122nd Legislature that would raise the bounty from $1 to $3, James said.
The department would also like to boost its aggressive education program, by hiring a temporary state employee to transport the switches to Westco facilities, he said.
"We do think it can work better," James said. - Bangor (Maine) Daily News