Unfortunately it has seem that this day has come, when I was looking for details on MV lamps on the North American Eye site, the following notice has appeared in the section regarding MV lamps.

EYE Lighting has discontinued manufacturing of all types of mercury lamps. This is in response to the Minamata Convention Agreement.

Once our limited inventory is gone, we will not manufacture more.

Since the US, Canada, and Japan have all signed and ratified the Minamata Convention, I suppose the news may hold true for the other manufacturers too.

Eye had the largest full line of mercury lamps remaining so these might be the last 700w ANSI spec mercury lamps made. The same applies for the clear mercury lamps outside the more common wattages.

Fortunately, the common wattages of MV lamp in small quanitites are still easy to find on the surplus and secondary market (eBay, Restore, etc) and with the longevity of MV, a case of quality MV lamps can effective relamp a single luminaire for a lifetime.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dammit i thought they would keep making these. The last quality manufacturer having to throw away there lamp making.

I think i need to order a case while i can.

Yeah definitely bad news for sure. I was hoping that they'd continued making mercury lamps for the North American market but the fact that they announced the discontinuation for the Japanese market was not a good sign.

Anyway I would aim to collection any of the more niche products first, IMO these would be the low wattage clear lamps, the reflector lamps, and the 700w lamps. These were always niche products and the production levels were always lower relative to the more common products which means there's less stock of them and less likely for them to show up on eBay in the future. You can see this with the availability of NOS mercury ballasts now, 50w and 75w are harder to find, 100w-1kW are still common to find, and 700w is practically impossible to find.

The 175-400w range will probably be produced and stocked in higher quantities.

Man, I'm glad I decided to pick up a 4 pack of Eye 50w and a 4 pack of Eye 75w clear MV lamps when I got the chance to. I believe the 75w clear packs are still available on eBay for the time being. 

Just as Bulbman said, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! Does this Minamata Convention BS mean every type of mercury-containing lamp is banned?

I've grown used to this trend. I just collect what I can. Which I have probably enough already to last me a lifetime. But I'm still collecting.

I'll collect til it's impossible or too expensive, or I'm too unfit to go into abandoned buildings.

Unfortunately it has seem that this day has come, when I was looking for details on MV lamps on the North American Eye site, the following notice has appeared in the section regarding MV lamps.
 

Since the US, Canada, and Japan have all signed and ratified the Minamata Convention, I suppose the news may hold true for the other manufacturers too.

Eye had the largest full line of mercury lamps remaining so these might be the last 700w ANSI spec mercury lamps made. The same applies for the clear mercury lamps outside the more common wattages.

Fortunately, the common wattages of MV lamp in small quanitites are still easy to find on the surplus and secondary market (eBay, Restore, etc) and with the longevity of MV, a case of quality MV lamps can effective relamp a single luminaire for a lifetime.

Hello joseph_125,

this is bad news. The quality of these lamps is very good.
One more reason to buy a few more.

Greetings from Hamburg

Olav

Looks like Sylvania which makes the best modern Mercury lamps right now in my opinion still has no plans of discontinuing them looking on their site and their catalogues so we still have them thankfully.

Yeah, I can't say I didn't see this coming eventually and yeah let's hope Sylvania continues production for a bit longer.

Anyway I dug some more and found a more detailed statement from Eye about this. At least they're not discontinuing all their lineup of HID lamps.

Jul 7, 2020

Dear Sir / Madam,
Thank you for your continued support

As you may or may not already be aware, following the enactment of the Minamata Convention on Mercury on August 16th 2017, the production, import, and export of all mercury lamps is to be prohibited from 2021. We regret to announce that consequently, as of June 2020 we are no longer accepting any new production orders of our mercury lamp range.

Where possible, any orders received from July 2020 onwards will be fulfilled from existing stock items, but please be aware that as this is limited, we may on occasion be unable to fulfil all orders. We would like to thank you in advance for your understanding in regarding this matter.

To our valued customers who have supported this product line over the years, we would like to offer our apologies for any inconvenience this may cause.

• Effective December 31st 2020, all high pressure mercury vapour lamps for general lighting applications will prohibited.
  
• Production of our ceramic metal halide, metal halide, and high pressure sodium lamp ranges will continue for the time being.

What would this mean for acquiring lamps down in Australia? Does this mean that they are ceasing production everywhere or just for North America?

Well , THAT SUCKS !!   This leads me to believe that ALL mercury lamps from ALL manufacturers will indeed go BYE-BYE in short order . And , since mercury is used in other forms of lighting (MH , HPS , fluorescent ) I'd say that they aren't long for this world either !! This will seriously hurt some of the "poor" cities that still run MV that don't have the budget for a completely new streetlighting system . 

I feel like, yeah they're more or less ceasing production of MV globally and yeah the other manufacturers will probably discontinue MV lamps in a similar manner. And yeah the small towns here that had MV for years might be seriously hurt from this. 

Last time I was there , Toledo Ohio was still close to 50% mercury vapor !

So this is gonna be it for mercury vapor (and possibly all HID and fluorescent) then? Fun news to come back to after taking a much needed break from here, I will say that. Been considering quitting the hobby quite a bit recently and giving away all but a few things of my collection, and stuff like this is exactly why. I'm tired of the constant bad news and disappointments and pressure to stock up on things that comes with it when there are far more fulfilling things I could be doing.

If Eye, the one manufacturer I always thought would be the go-to for mercury lamps is suddenly discontinuing everything I don't think things are looking good. The rebellious part of me wants to try and figure out some way to manufacture mercury vapor lamps myself but I don't have the time, money, or resources to do that.

Don't get discouraged . This is unfortunately , the way of the world with everything , not just lighting . I also collect old cars and as much as I love the old tech , I know it's a dying breed. I love the old stuff not just for the styling , but for the fact that the "average Joe" (or Josephine) who has at least a little mechanical knowledge can actually FIX HIS/HER OWN CAR !! All of these modern pieces of crap require a Rocket scientist with a P.H.D. and an Electronics engineering degree just to replace a head light .

Well said, some other hobbies of mine are collecting older incandescent traffic lights and old cassette decks and tapes. With traffic lights, incandescent traffic lights have been pretty much phased out for years and cassettes are a very niche item now and the older hifi decks and higher grade tapes are basically a dying breed.

And yeah, while I have more or less fixed everything from smartphones to older cars and appliances. I definitely enjoy working on the old stuff a lot more than the modern stuff. Whether it be cars, appliances, electronics, even laptops.

I'll be honest, in the very distant future I could totally see myself if I or someone else on here if they have the means to, owning a workshop that has everything you need to make a HID light from scratch. Be it housing, ballast, and even the lamp. Then perhaps I/they can sell things like lamps, ballasts, even complete luminaires. To collectors, effects and theatrical designers etc who still wants to use the older tech.

Yeah when you see a notice like this, the pressure to stock up, especially the upfront investment and storage space needed really is pretty draining sometimes.