DeMott Robert P, Balaraman Anita, Sorensen Mary T
ENVIRON International Corporation, 10150 Highland Manor Drive, Tampa, FL 33610, USA.
Integr Environ Assess Manag. 2005 Jan;1(1):77-82. doi: 10.1897/ieam_2004a-024.1.
As part of an agency evaluation of the development of risk assessment tools, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) issued a staff paper in March 2004 describing the current state of practices and policies regarding risk assessment from the agency's perspective. The staff paper provided a rationale for the agency's positions regarding technical topics frequently the subject of comments or complaints. Considerations relevant to ecological risk assessment were included, primarily in a single chapter focused on this topic. This commentary highlights four technical issues important to the advancement of ecological risk assessment practice and discusses how some of the points raised by the U.S. EPA in the staff paper have significance to ecological risk assessors. Discussion regarding incorporating population- and community-level analysis into risk assessments and the apparent reluctance of the U.S. EPA to adopt advances in this area is provided. Also, continuing inconsistencies in the body weight scaling of toxicity values between human health and ecological risk assessment practices are discussed. Ideas for refining the calculation of exposure point concentrations for ecological receptors and the progression between screening steps and comprehensive risk assessment are also discussed.
作为某机构对风险评估工具发展情况评估的一部分，美国环境保护局（U.S. EPA）于2004年3月发布了一份工作人员文件，从该机构的角度描述了风险评估方面的现行做法和政策状况。这份工作人员文件为该机构在经常成为评论或投诉对象的技术主题上的立场提供了依据。其中包括了与生态风险评估相关的考量因素，主要集中在单独的一章中论述这一主题。本评论突出了对推进生态风险评估实践至关重要的四个技术问题，并讨论了美国环境保护局在工作人员文件中提出的一些观点对生态风险评估人员的意义。文中给出了关于将种群和群落水平分析纳入风险评估以及美国环境保护局在这一领域明显不愿采用相关进展的讨论。此外，还讨论了人类健康和生态风险评估实践中毒性值体重换算方面持续存在的不一致性。文中还探讨了完善生态受体暴露点浓度计算方法以及筛选步骤与全面风险评估之间递进关系的思路。
