Tiered testing for chemical hazard assessment

Hushon, Judith M.; Clerman, Robert; Wagner, Burkhard O.

doi:10.1021/es60158a608

Cited by 12 publications

(2 citation statements)

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“…Although higher tiers (levels) have been also developed, they are based on much more elaborate and expensive field or semifield tests, and thus carried out only exceptionally, when lower‐tier tests strongly suggest a possible hazard. This hierarchical, multilevel (tiered) testing of chemical hazard to the environment was proposed in the 1970s (Hushon et al ) and is used in ERA worldwide. The first steps are, however, always lower‐tier simple bioassays.…”

Section: Why Complicate Our Lives?mentioning

confidence: 99%

More ecological ERA: Incorporating natural environmental factors and animal behavior

Bednarska

Jevtić

Laskowski

2013

Integr Envir Assess & Manag

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We discuss the importance of selected natural abiotic and biotic factors in ecological risk assessment based on simplistic laboratory bioassays. Although it is impossible to include all possible natural factors in standard lower-tier ecotoxicological testing, neglecting them is not an option. Therefore, we try to identify the most important factors and advocate redesigning standard testing procedures to include theoretically most potent interactions. We also point out a few potentially important factors that have not been studied enough so far. The available data allowed us to identify temperature and O2 depletion as the most critical factors that should be included in ecotoxicity testing as soon as possible. Temporal limitations and fluctuations in food availability also appear important, but at this point more fundamental research in this area is necessary before making decisions on their inclusion in risk assessment procedures. We propose using specific experimental designs, such as Box-Behnken or Central Composite, which allow for simultaneous testing of 3 or more factors for their individual and interactive effects with greater precision and without increasing the effort and costs of tests dramatically. Factorial design can lead to more powerful tests and help to extend the validity of conclusions. Finally, ecological risk assessment procedures should include information on animal behavior, especially feeding patterns. This requires more basic studies, but already at this point adequate mechanistic effect models can be developed for some species.

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Section: Why Complicate Our Lives?mentioning

confidence: 99%

More ecological ERA: Incorporating natural environmental factors and animal behavior

Bednarska

Jevtić

Laskowski

2013

Integr Envir Assess & Manag

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“…A tiered approach is a stepwise approach to environmental assessment that involves "progressive data and resource intensity" (EPA 1998). Tiered approaches have long been recommended for evaluating hazards from new chemicals (Huchon et al 1979), evaluating human and ecological risks from releases of petroleum (ASTM 1994), and as an option for conducting ecological risk assessments (EPA 1998). Tiered analysis provides an opportunity for evaluation and decision-making at each stage, or tier.…”

Section: Tiered Assessmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

A retrospective tiered environmental assessment of the Mount Storm Wind Energy Facility, West Virginia,USA

Efroymson¹,

Day²,

Strickland³

2012

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Bird and bat fatalities from wind energy projects are an environmental and public concern, with post-construction fatalities sometimes differing from predictions. Siting facilities in this context can be a challenge. In March 2012 the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) released "Land-based Wind Energy Guidelines" to assess collision fatalities and other potential impacts to species of concern and their habitats to aid in siting and management. The Guidelines recommend a tiered approach for assessing risk to wildlife, including a preliminary site evaluation that may evaluate alternative sites, a site characterization, field studies to document wildlife and habitat and to predict project impacts, and post-construction studies to estimate fatalities and other impacts and to better understand causes of adverse impacts or ineffective mitigation. We applied the tiered assessment framework to a case study site, the Mount Storm Wind Energy Facility in Grant County, West Virginia, USA, to demonstrate the use of the USFWS assessment approach, to indicate how the use of a tiered assessment framework might have altered outputs of wildlife assessments previously undertaken for the case study site, and to assess benefits of a tiered ecological assessment framework for siting wind energy facilities. For birds, the conclusions of this tiered assessment are similar to those of previous environmental assessments for Mount Storm. For bats, this assessment found risk to individual migratory tree-roosting bats that was not emphasized in previous preconstruction assessments. Differences compared to previous environmental assessments are related more to knowledge accrued in the past 10 years than to the tiered structure of the Guidelines. Benefits of the tiered assessment framework include good communication among stakeholders, clear decision points, a standard assessment trajectory, narrowing the list of species of concern, improving study protocols, promoting consideration of population-level effects, promoting adaptive management through post-construction assessment and mitigation, and sharing information that can be used in other assessments.

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Ecological toxicology: Experimental analysis of toxic substances in ecosystems

Hendrix

1982

Enviro Toxic and Chemistry

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Premanufacture testing of new chemicals is considered as an applied problem in biogeochemistry, consisting of experimentation at several complimentary levels of resolution. A descending sequential testing protocol is proposed which begins with combined fate and effects experiments in ecosystems (e.g., laboratory microcosms) followed by studies of processes and species which are hypothesized to be important at finer levels of resolution.

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Tiered testing for chemical hazard assessment

Cited by 12 publications

References 0 publications

More ecological ERA: Incorporating natural environmental factors and animal behavior

More ecological ERA: Incorporating natural environmental factors and animal behavior

A retrospective tiered environmental assessment of the Mount Storm Wind Energy Facility, West Virginia,USA

Ecological toxicology: Experimental analysis of toxic substances in ecosystems

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