Activities per year
Abstract
Current regulatory practice for chemical risk assessment suffers from the lack of realism in conventional frameworks. Despite significant advances in exposure and ecological effect modelling, the implementation of novel approaches as high tier options for prospective regulatory risk assessment remains limited, particularly among general chemicals such as down-the-drain ingredients. While reviewing the current state of art in environmental exposure and ecological effect modelling, we propose a scenario-based framework that enables a better integration of exposure and effect assessments in a tiered approach. Global- to catchment-scale spatially explicit exposure models can be used to identify areas of higher exposure and to generate ecologically relevant exposure information for input into effect models. Numerous examples of mechanistic ecological effect models demonstrate that it is technically feasible to extrapolate from individual-level effects to effects at higher levels of biological organisation and from laboratory to environmental conditions. However, the data required to parameterize effect models that can embrace the complexity of ecosystems are large and require a targeted approach. Experimental efforts should, therefore, focus on vulnerable species/traits and ecological conditions of relevance. We outline key research needs to address the challenges that currently hinder the practical application of advanced model-based approaches to risk assessment of down-the-drain chemicals.
Original language | English |
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Journal | Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Accepted/In press - 2016 |
Keywords
- Down-the-drain chemicals
- ecological models
- environmental scenario
- ecological risk assessment
- spatial models
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setac europe 25th annual meeting
Frédérik De Laender (Organiser)
2015 → …Activity: Participating in or organising an event types › Participation in conference
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Unilever workshop on ecological scenarios
Frédérik De Laender (Speaker)
26 Sept 2014Activity: Participating in or organising an event types › Participation in workshop, seminar, course