In my mind, there's only two acceptable uses of lead: radiation (x-ray, gamma ray) shielding, and ICE batteries. Even then, I expect there's much increased demand for those things (and thus, the lead to manufacture them) from 50 years ago.
Lead batteries contain not just lead, but the H2SO4 needed to dissolve large amounts of it and transport it through watercourses when the plastic case inevitably cracks.
Too bad they use lead, because it would be too good to be true otherwise. You have to treat lithium batteries like a spoiled child in comparison.
You can overcome most of these issues, but it comes at a significant cost. I think it could be worth it, especially when you factor in that the lithium ion battery could theoretically pay for itself in longer lifespan, but most buyers would prefer the cheap, familiar, reliable option.
Why? I would posit that lithium batteries do way more damage to the environment than lead-acid batteries. Recycling of lead-acid batteries is very prevalent because it is economically worth it.
> Despite the smaller supply of lithium, a study earlier this year in the Journal of the Indian Institute of Science found that less than 1 percent of Lithium-ion batteries get recycled in the US and EU compared to 99 percent of lead-acid batteries, which are most often used in gas vehicles and power grids.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/04/lithium-costs-a-lot-...
Whenever I buy a lead-acid battery, I always have a core charge and it is a non-trivial percentage of the total cost of the battery. I get that core charge back when I return the old battery.
Lithium batteries have nothing comparable.
AFAIK soldering is not hot enough to vaporize lead.
The problem isn't vaporizing, or the first consumers direct exposure. The problem is taking a pound of lead and distrubuting it all over the environment in the form of spatter, shavings, assembled pcbs, connections, etc. Probably less than half of the solder winds up in a product or project, and that is just a short delay on it's trip to the envirnment when the project is discarded. 100% of it ends there, and not in a nice solid lump but practically aresolized.
It's the same as just taking that same pound of lead and directly grinding it into a fine powder and just sprinkling it everywhere, where it becomes part of the soil more or less and leeches into everything and can't be removed.
And 100,000 or a million or many millions of other people all doing the same thing, every day, for generations. Yess millions. There are 300million just in the US alone, and there are more than one person in every 300 that solders at least some times.
If your iron can hold it's temperature worth a darn, the lead-free solder is fine. If it can't, you're going to struggle no matter what you use.
Pure tin (or Sn99.3Cu0.7 alloy) is garbage, the silver helps a bunch.
For demanding applications there's apparently some even more performant alloys available today, eg. Innolot [1].
Because if that, many people consider the ban of industrial lead solder to be over-zealous. But that ban is in place to stop consumers being contaminated if they somehow touch the board. Also to minimise lead entering the water table once it is discarded.