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2.8. Summary
The major advantage of incorporating mixture assessment and biological effect detection is that the effects of chemical pollution can be identified more comprehensively, allowing further bridging between chemical and ecological status.
Most effects-based methods do not provide conclusive evidence of the chemical(s) responsible. That requires further, site-specific effort, which is where scientific technique bumps into a regulatory approach based on individual substances. Water managers need to, firstly, identify which components of the mixture are the main contributors to the harmful effects, and secondly, to reduce those inputs. However, this approach is not entirely new – “biological oxygen demand” (BOD) has been used many years as an integrated measure of water pollution.
In relation to chemical status assessment under WFD, the inclusion of techniques more sensitive to chemical pollution is likely to make it more difficult to achieve good chemical status. While this situation may reflect expert opinion based on current scientific knowledge as to “real chemical status” it would represent further difficulties in communicating progress under the WFD. One option could be for effects-based methods to be used as part of ecological status assessment.
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DE-NW:
At this point also the actual status of the effect-based methods with existing difficulties and knowledge gaps should be mentioned. The approach is pointing in the right direction but several tasks have to be dealt with before it can be applied.
Besides single test systems and MoA which are ready to use (estrogens) for which also field studies have been succesfully performed, for most other MoA´s and test systems work is still pending. Robustness, reliability and relevance have to be demonstrated in extensive field studies before they can be applied.
DE-UBA II 2.5:
The report shall provide an in-depth assessment on the key pollutants using mainly data of the WFD monitoring. In this respect we wonder why in chapter 2 (subchapters 2.3 – 2.8) a new approach is explained very much in detail. Short examples regarding chemical pollution and related effects should be illustrative and clear. General vague conclusions should be avoided (e.g. page 22: Results showed the presence of different chemicals at different levels of pollution with diverse modes of action.) From our point of view scientific considerations in chapter 2 could be shorten and supplemented by activities at EU level such as the watch list mechanism. The whole report would benefit from keeping short and concise
[HK1]Kommentar zweimal eingefügt, general und bei 2.8
P26 “Most EBMs do not provide conclusive evidence of the chemical(s) responsible” This needs further attention. If they don’t lead you in the right direction then they serve no useful purpose. There’s a lot of experience in the US of TIE (‘Toxicity Identification Evaluations’) methods for chemical diagnosis – how effective is that? Is it still used?
page 26 - Summary - last sentence is key – it is which components of the mixture are the main contributors to the harmful effects.