Ammunition
Environmental problems

As of 2013, lead-based ammunition production is the second-largest annual use of lead in the US, accounting for over 60,000 metric tons consumed in 2012. In contrast to the closed-loop nature of the largest annual use of lead (i.e. for lead-acid batteries, nearly all of which are, at the end of their lives, collected and recycled into new lead-acid batteries), the lead in ammunition ends up being almost entirely dispersed into the natural environment. For example, lead bullets that miss their target or remain in a carcass or body that was never retrieved can very easily enter environmental systems and become toxic to wildlife. The US military has experimented with replacing lead with copper as a slug in their green bullets which reduces the dangers posed by lead in the environment as a result of artillery. Since 2010, this has eliminated over 2000 tons of lead in waste streams.

Hunters are also encouraged to use monolithic bullets, which exclude any lead content.
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