Persistent, Bioaccumulative and Toxics PBT Program Setting the Context

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Persistent, Bioaccumulative and Toxics (PBT)
ProgramSetting the Context

• TOM MURRAY, USEPA
• EPA PBT Monitoring Workshop
• April 22, 2002
• Raleigh, North Carolina

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Happy Earth Day!
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IM HERE TO .

• Provide some context
• Explore the question Who cares?
• A Perspective on the Monitoring Strategy
• Share a few thoughts on the challenges that lie
  ahead

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The Context

• The PBT Program as an organizing principle
• GPRA goals and measures
• Our scope
• The PBT Program National Action Plans

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The Context

• The PBT Program as an organizing principle

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What is the PBT Program?

• All programs working together to
• Identify and reduce risks to human health and the
  environment from current and future exposures to
  priority PBT pollutants
• Stop their transfer across environmental media!
• Prevent new PBT chemicals from entering commerce

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What are its Program Goals?

• Reduce risks to human health and the environment
  from current and future exposures to priority PBT
  contaminants
• Reduce/eliminate PBT emissions in U.S. and
  promote international reductions
• Reduce exposure of general U.S. populations,
  especially high risk populations

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The National PBT Program Agenda

• Focus on Mercury, Dioxin/Furans, PCBs first
• Focus on two cross-cutting issues
• MONITORING
• Outreach/risk communication
• Derive actions from National Action Plans
• Get the resources to where the action is
• Build on successful efforts
• Provide the tools to get the job done

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What is the value added by the PBT Program?

• It facilitates corporate decisionmaking.
• It simplifies communication to outside
  stakeholders.
• It fosters holistic problem solving.
• It engenders the use of sound science.
• It leads to win-win solutions, more responsible
  spending and more effective coordination among
  programs both within and outside of EPA.

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• NHANES

• Alaskan Native Fetal Cord Blood Monitoring Program

• Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program

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What fuels the PBT Program?

• Human Health and Ecological Concerns
• Realization that some single-medium approaches
  fall short
• Realization that for efforts like monitoring, no
  one program can do it
• States, Tribes, Legislators, Stakeholders
• Tenacity, hard work and determination
• A specified Agency-wide budget

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• Http//intranet.epa.gov/ocfo/plan/plan.htm

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PBT Program Management Structure
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The Context

• The PBT Program as an organizing principle
• GPRA goals and measures

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GPRA GOALS

• 2005 2006 2007

• DOI

• GPRA

• EPA

• HHS

• DOC

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The Context

• The PBT Program as an organizing principle
• GPRA goals and measures
• Scope

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PBTs -- A Global Priority

• "Pollutants that are persistent, bioaccumulative
  and toxic have been linked to numerous adverse
  effects in humans and animals. The United States
  has taken extensive action over the years to
  address these pollutants. But such pollutants not
  only remain in the environment for years and even
  decades, they also travel far beyond their
  initial points of release, posing threats across
  national and geographic boundaries. Only by
  addressing the threat of these pollutants on a
  global scale can we help to meet our goal of
  leaving America's air cleaner, our water purer,
  and our land better protected.
  -Christine Todd Whitman

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The Context

• The PBT Program as an organizing principle
• GPRA goals and measures
• Scope
• The PBT Program National Action Plans

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National Action Plans

• Alkyl-Lead
• Benzo(a)Pyrene
• Dioxins/Furans
• Hexachlorobenzene
• Mercury and Compounds
• Octachlorostyrene
• PCBs
• PESTICIDES
• Aldrin/Dieldrin, Chlordane
• Mirex,DDT(DDDDDE), Camphechlor(Toxaphene)

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What are the major monitoring needs identified in
the NAPs?

• Magnitude and nature of the human Exposure
  Problem (Hg, Dioxins, B(a)P, HCB)
• Magnitude and nature of exposure for high-risk
  populations (PCBs, Dioxins, HCB, B(a)P)
• Long-term National Environmental Trends (Hg,
  PCBs,Dioxins, Pesticides,HCB, B(a)P and OCS)

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What are the major monitoring needs identified in
the NAPs?

• International Contribution (Mercury, PCBs,
  Dioxins, Pesticides, HCB, B(a)P
• Monitoring data to support environmental modeling
  needs in predicting environmental levels and
  multimedia transfers (Hg, PCBs and Dioxins)
• Support for Fish and Wildlife Consumption
  Advisory Programs (Hg, PCBs, Dioxins and
  pesticides)

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What are the major monitoring needs identified in
the NAPs?

• Source Characterization (Hg, PCBs, Dioxins, HCB,
  B(a)P and OCS

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• Who Really Cares?

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Our decision makers care!

• Our Senior Management Officials
• The White House Office of Science and Technology
• U.S. General Accounting Office
• Commission for Environmental Cooperation
• UNEP

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But , more Importantly
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Our Tribal Partners Say

• Abnormalities in animals and fish (e. g. wormy
  whitefish and lesions on salmon, and Whirling
  disease)
• Moose meat tastes different and there are water
  bags in their lungs
• Muskrats have spots on their liver and lungs
• Caribou have runny bone marrow

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A National Routine Monitoring Strategy should

• Summarize and orchestrate current PBT monitoring
  activities
• Discern trends in both human health and
  ecosystems (GPRA?)
• Measure the effectiveness of national actions to
  meet the PBT program goals
• Integrate across environmental media
• Integrate modeling

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Challenges
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1. No single governmental jurisdiction can solve
the problem!!

• All federal, state, tribal, international
  organizations must work together!

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2 Monitoring is Costly

• Find ways to leverage

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3 Monitoring takes time to yield valid results

• Persevere! And think of ways to keep impatient
  decision makers happy

• Maryland Terps National Champions!!

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4. Maintain the vision

• As pollution problems become more complex, our
  monitoring programs must become more
  sophisticated and cost-effective. We cannot
  control what we cannot measure and we cannot
  correct what we do not know.
• John R. Quarles, Jr. Deputy Administrator
• 1977