Environmental quality criteria

The environmental standards for various compounds are derived from toxicity data in the literature. In The Netherlands, quality criteria based on human and 

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Environment A number of melt water quality analyses of heavy metals, hydrocarbons, oxygen demands, and nutrients were made. From September 2001 to September 2002 measurements were made in the snow storage, in the stream where melt water is discharged and in the recipient, totally at seven locations. Reference measurements were made at a nearby location not affected by the outlet water. The results were compared with Swedish environmental quality criteria (SEPA, 1990 SEPA, 1999). 

SEPA Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, 1999. Bedomningsgrunder formiljokvalitet-sjoar och vattendrag (Environmental quality criteria - lakes and water courses). Report 4913, ISBN 91-620-4913-5. 

Fig. 2.11. Comparison of PCDDs/DFs levels in Korean environments with environmental quality criteria proposed worldwide. Range indicates minimum (min), maximum (max), median (med), and arithmetic mean (avg). Dotted lines indicate environmental quality criteria 0.6pg TEQ m i for ambient air (EQC-a), 1 pg TEQ L-1 for ambient water (EQC-wl) and lOpg TEQ I. (EQC-w2) for wastewater, 5 (EQC-sl) and 40 (EQC-s2) pg TEQ g-1 dw for soil, and 0.85 (EQC-fs) and 21.5 (EQC-ss) pg TEQ g-1 dw for sediment. Japanese data is based on WHO-TEQs including PCDDs/DFs and coPCBs (JMOE, 2002).

In South Korea, no environmental quality criteria (EQCs) have been proposed to protect human health and wildlife from dioxin-like compounds. Thus, we compared concentrations of TEQ measured in individual media with EQCs or benchmarks for PCDDs/DFs proposed by other governments worldwide (Fig. 2.11). Japan proposes EQCs for ambient air and water of 0.6 pg WHO-TEQ m-3 for air, 1 pg WHO-TEQ L 1 for public water and 10 pg WHO-TEQ L 1 for wastewater (JMOE, 2002). Since 1999, concentrations of TEQ measured in air from within 1 km of waste incinerators and/or industrial area and sites in industrial cities, have exceeded the EQCs established by Japan (0.6 pg WHO-TEQ m-3) 22% and 29%, respectively. Alternatively, only 7% of air samples from urban and background sites exceeded the EQCs (Fig. 2.11a). This indicates that air quality is poorer in South Korea than in Japan where only 1.1% of 920 air samples collected in Japan during 2000 exceeded EQC (Shibata, 2002). The EQC values are applied differently, depending on the objective. Generally, landfill leachates exceeded the EQC (10 pg WHO-TEQ L 1) more frequently (30%) than the wastewaters discharged... 

Fig. 2.22. Comparison of measured levels and environmental quality criteria (EQCs) for nonylphenol (NP) in water, soil and sediments from the various sites, in South Korea (a) water (n = 172), (b) soil (n = 105), (c) freshwater sediment (n = 131), (d) brakish sediment (n = 47), (e) marine sediment (n = 93). Range indicates minimum (min), maximum (max), and arithmetic mean (avg.). Dotted lines represent Canadian EQCs proposed for marine water (WQC-m) and freshwater (WQC-f), and marine sediment (SQG-m) and freshwater sediment (SQG-f) (see the text).

SimpleBox was created as a research tool in environmental risk assessment. Simple-Box (Brandes et al. 1996) is implemented in the regulatory European Union System for the Evaluation of Substances (EUSES) models (Vermeire et al. 1997) that are used for risk assessment of new and existing chemicals. Dedicated SimpleBox 1.0 applications have been used for integrating environmental quality criteria for air, water, and soil in The Netherlands. Spreadsheet versions of SimpleBox 2.0 are used for multi-media chemical fate modeling by scientists at universities and research institutes in various countries. SimpleBox models exposure concentrations in the environmental media. In addition to exposure concentrations, SimpleBox provides output at the level of toxic pressure on ecosystems by calculating potentially affected fractions (PAF) on the basis of species sensitivity distribution (SSD) calculus (see Chapter 4). 

Exposure aspects of mixture risk Effects aspects of mixture risk Derivation of environmental quality criteria for mixtures... 

Species sensitivity distributions (SSDs) are used for both prospective and retrospective risk assessments (Posthuma et al. 2002b). In prospective risk assessments, the concept is used to derive hazardous concentrations (e.g., HC5), which are used to derive environmental quality criteria. In retrospective risk assessments, the SSD approach is used to determine the local toxic pressure in terms of the potentially affected fraction (PAF) of species for each compound separately. Subsequently the multisubstance (ms)PAF, or optionally the combi-PAF, for the local mixture can be calculated. Originally, the combi-PAF concept was developed by Hamers et al. (1996) and assumes that only compounds exerting narcotic effects... 

There are numerous examples of no extrapolation. The clearest example is the common practice of setting environmental quality criteria for each compound separately. Conceptually, it is difficult to imagine how a single quality objective could be formulated for every possible mixture in terms of maximum permissible mixture concentration, unless one could develop a criterion that is formulated as a maximization of impact or risk. 

When using TU-based approaches, specific attention should be paid to the definition of the units that are used. Commonly, these units are the environmental quality criteria that are locally applicable. In The Netherlands, however, a total of 3 CCUs does not necessarily imply that there are ecosystem risks. This relates to the fact that... 

Extrapolation methods are used for various types of risk assessment. Methods may be used in the process of deriving environmental quality objectives, in the registration of new substances, and in the process of site-specific risk assessment. Suter (1993) called these approaches prospective (the former 2) and retrospective (the latter) risk assessments. The specific process in which extrapolation methods are used has implications for the concepts to be applied and the data to be used as input in extrapolation. Strictly described approaches are in place for the derivation of environmental quality criteria (EQCs) and the registration of pesticides and newly developed substances. The prescribed approaches for deriving EQCs can differ between jurisdictions. The approaches for retrospective investigations have more degrees of freedom. A characteristic of the latter approach is that the methods can make use of measured local exposure levels and can estimate local risk with known precision (or known uncertainty ). The latter is uncommon for EQCs. 

It is noteworthy that comparisons of existing assessment schemes reveal dissimilarities in the use of extrapolation methods and their input data between different jurisdictions and between prospective and retrospective assessment schemes. This is clearly apparent from, for example, a set of scientific comparisons of 5% hazardous concentration (HC5) values for different substances. Absolute HC5 values and their lower confidence values were different among the different statistical models that can be used to describe a species sensitivity distribution (SSD Wheeler et al. 2002a). As different countries have made different choices in the prescribed modeling by SSDs (regarding data quality, preferred model, etc.), it is clear that different jurisdictions may have different environmental quality criteria for the same substance. Considering the science, the absolute values could be the same in view of the fact that the assessment problem, the available extrapolation methods, and the possible set of input data are (scientifically) similar across jurisdictions. When it is possible, however, to look at the confidence intervals, the numerical differences resulting from different details in method choice become smaller because confidence intervals show overlap. 

Romijn CAFM, Luttik R, Canton J. 1993a. Presentation of a general algorithm to include effect assessment on secondary poisoning in the derivation of environmental quality criteria. 2. Terrestrial food chains. Ecotoxicol Environ Safety 26 61-83. 

In the past, actions against pollution were normally taken only when the problems were severe and obvious. No detailed study was necessary to know that the benefits of the action outweighed the costs. The situation has been changing in recent years. Various environmental quality criteria (for air, water, and soil) have been developed as guidelines for the decision maker. In many cases, however, more elaborate analyses may be necessary to determine if the benefits of a certain control option outweigh the costs, or to rank various control options. 

In Europe, SARs are coming into use for hazard assessment of new chemicals under the European Economic Community (EEC) (Bol et al., 1993). Many endeavours on the use of SARs as an aid in setting environmental quality criteria have been made in The Netherlands (Verhaar et al., 1992). 

CCME (Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment) (1991) Interim Canadian Environmental Quality Criteria for Contaminated Sites, Report CCME EPC-CS34. CCME, Subcommittee on Environmental Quality Criteria for Contaminated Sites, Winnipeg, Manitoba. 

The sustainable use of military installations for training and testing requires the development of environmental quality criteria that can be consistently applied in different countries to gauge the ecotoxicological impacts of these operations. To overcome jurisdictional limitations of Eco-SSL and ESI, developed for U.S. Superfund sites and Canadian DND sites, respectively, and to make the Eco-SSL scientific approach useful internationally, the Eco-SSL methodology was applied for developing a set of ETVs for several explosives and related soil contaminants. This chapter... 

The methodology of SSD has been used for derivation of environmental quality criteria and for ecological risk assessment. In this chapter, the ecosystem was assumed to be preserved when 95% of species are protected [39], and in this screening-level risk assessment, if the actual or estimated environmental concentration of SCCPs is larger than the HC5 which will protect 95% of species based on the SSD, it is interpreted that it should be assessed further. Risk characterization for birds, the higher predators is also performed because of the high bioconcentration of SCCPs in fish. 

The values of accumulation might lie in the range from 1.8 ppm (for U) to 488.0 ppm (forBa), and these values have to be added to the natural content of heavy metals in soils (see Tables 5 and 6). The resulting (cumulative) values for rapidly accumulated HM (As, Ba, Cr, Ni and V) exceed the existing environmental quality criteria values for HM content in soils (Radojevich and Bashkin, 1999) shown in Table 7. 

Table 7. Selected environmental quality criteria for HM content (Radojevic and Bashkin, 1999). in soils, ppm...

IVansport of Dangerous Goods Act Provincial/ Territorial Hazardous Wastes lists regulations under Canadian Environmental Protection Act Canadian Environmental Quality Criteria for Contaminated Sites etc. 

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