There is a good article in the June 2014 American Rifleman mag about the Army replacing its 556 NATO M855 round with a new “green” M855A1 lead-free round. Seems that after much development, the new M855A1 round is far better than the old lead round. The A1 uses a steel penetrator tip with a copper core. Results indicate the A1 round not only penetrates barriers such as concrete masonry, better than the old round, but also has improved terminal ballistics. While the old round penetrated 3/8 inch mild steel at up to 160 meters, the new round penetrated the same 3/8 inch mild steel out to a distance of 350 meters. Additionally, the old round began to yaw at 7 inches after penetration into the boney Taliban, which would actually exit without much damage at all, while the new round is designed to begin yaw at +3 inches of penetration in dem bag of bones. Accuracy is equal or better too. So we’ll need to watch how this plays out in other calibers, barrel twists, etc.
And the relative price of this new, better ammo?