How many Persistent Organic Pollutants should we expect?

Publikation: Beiträge in ZeitschriftenZeitschriftenaufsätzeForschungbegutachtet

Authors

  • Martin Scheringer
  • Sebastian Strempel
  • Sirja Hukari
  • Carla A. Ng
  • Markus Blepp
  • Konrad Hungerbühler
Under the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs), currently 22 chemicals or groups of chemicals are regulated as POPs. However, various screening exercises performed on large sets of chemicals indicate that the number of substances fulfilling the screening criteria defined in Annex D of the Stockholm Convention might be much higher. Most of these screening studies searched for highly persistent and bioaccumulative chemicals, but did not include the long-range transport potential, which is a key criterion under the Stockholm Convention. We apply the screening criteria for persistence, bioaccumulation and long-range transport potential of the Stockholm Convention to a set of 93 144 organic chemicals. Because no toxicity threshold is defined under the Stockholm Convention, we use the toxicity threshold of REACH, the chemicals regulation of the European Union. For the vast majority of the chemicals, the property data required for the assessment had to be estimated from the chemical structure. Assessment results for the acknowledged POPs and for POP candidates currently under review are discussed. Beyond these well-known substances, we find 510 chemicals that exceed all four critieria and can be considered potential POPs. Ninety eight percent of these chemicals are halogenated; frequent types of chemicals are halogenated aromatic compounds, including polychlorinated diphenylethers, tetrachloro benzyltoluenes, brominated and fluorinated naphthalenes and biphenyls; and highly or fully chlorinated and fluorinated alkanes (cyclic, linear, branched). Non-halogenated substances are highly branched alkanes and nitroaromatic compounds. Ten substances are high-production volume chemicals and 249 are pre-registered in the EU. We used uncertainty ranges of the chemical property data to estimate a lower and upper bound of the number of potential POPs; these bounds are at 190 and 1 200 chemicals. These results imply that several tens of potential POPs may have to be expected for future evaluation under the Stockholm Convention.
OriginalspracheEnglisch
ZeitschriftAtmospheric Pollution Research : Turkish National Committee for Air Pollution Research and Control
Jahrgang3
Ausgabenummer4
Seiten (von - bis)383-391
Anzahl der Seiten9
ISSN1309-1042
DOIs
PublikationsstatusErschienen - 01.10.2012
Extern publiziertJa

Dokumente

DOI

Zuletzt angesehen

Forschende

  1. Marlene Mader

Publikationen

  1. The strength of vertical linkages
  2. On the micro-structure of the German export boom
  3. “Normality” Revisited: Fieldwork and Family
  4. On the micro-structure of the German export boom
  5. Semi-polar root exudates in natural grassland communities
  6. Minimum return guarantees, investment caps, and investment flexibility
  7. The persistent decline in unionization in western and eastern Germany, 1980 - 2004
  8. Abiotic and biotic drivers of tree trait effects on soil microbial biomass and soil carbon concentration
  9. Analysis of ammonia losses after field application of biogas slurries by an empirical model
  10. Up, up and away: An update on the UK's latest plans for space activities
  11. § 394
  12. The influence of landscape change on multiple dimensions of human–nature connectedness
  13. Activities in retirement
  14. Akademisches Schreiben
  15. Organizational Restructuring as a Self-Reinforcing Process
  16. Egozentrierte Netzwerkanalysen
  17. Economies of scope in European railways
  18. Building a bridge between school and university
  19. Konsolidierung oder Emergenz?
  20. Patterns of entrepreneurial career development
  21. Primary source regions of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) measured in the Arctic
  22. (Inhibiting) Factors for (Un)Sustainable Behaviour in Relation to the Effects of Education for Sustainable Development
  23. Tackling the knowledge-action gap in sustainable consumption
  24. § 328
  25. Wolke 7
  26. Bank management of the net interest margin
  27. Introduction
  28. The pandemic as challenge for intercultural and interreligious relations
  29. (Re)Produktivität
  30. Inmitten der Extreme
  31. Meta-custom and the court
  32. How Music Touches