Persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic chemicals

The chlorinated chemicals assessed do not have the same risk profile. For the more volatile chemicals the safety margins between the actual exposure and the level at which no effect on the environment would be expected is quite high. For more persistent chemicals there is a need to look to the environmental compartment where they can be accumulated (mainly in sediments and biota). For some of these chemicals the safety margin is quite low and in worst-case situations serious effects may occur. For the very persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic chemicals (like dioxins, PCBs and DDT), acceptable environmental concentrations are so low and difficult to control that the industry is committed to reducing as far as possible releases to the environment through application of Best Available Techniques (BAT), mainly with respect to dioxins. For other chemicals (PCBs, DDT), production has already been halted for some years. 

The so-called persistent organic pollutants (POPs) are the subject of the Rio Declaration (1994) and the Stockholm Convention (2001) these international agreements (yet to be ratified in all signatory countries, including the United States) call for the elimination from production of 12 persistent chemicals, including the chlorinated pesticides and PCBs mentioned above (all of which have already been eliminated from production in the United States). Current regulatory efforts in the European Union and the United States place emphasis on elimination or restriction of all PBTs (persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic chemicals). 

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PBT (Persistent, Bioaccumulative, and Toxic) Chemicals, Pages 334-336, Thomas M. Murray SummaryPlus Full Text + Links PDF (66 K)... 

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PBTs Project OCOEN REPORT No.150 Persistent, Bioaccumulative and Toxic Chemicals in Central and Eastern European Countries (State-of-the-art Report prepared under R-T A by Ivan Holoubek, Anton Kocan, Irena Holoubkova, Jifi Kohoutek, Jerzy Falandysz) ... 

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