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What’s the buzz: EPA-ORD is developing method guidance for more species for effluent and ambient toxicity testing methods
Citation:
Norberg-King, T. AND J. Lazorchak. What’s the buzz: EPA-ORD is developing method guidance for more species for effluent and ambient toxicity testing methods. SETAC North America, Toronto, ON, CANADA, November 03 - 07, 2019.
Impact/Purpose:
Clean Water Act (CWA) implementation starts with the development of water quality criteria to protect uses, such as aquatic life. EPA’s National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits system provides protection for our nation’s waters with water quality criteria, whole effluent toxicity and bioassessments. As such, whole effluent toxicity (WET) methods are used to assess whether chemical mixtures of effluents and ambient waters are causing toxicity to aquatic life, thereby filling a key role in meeting the CWA goal of “no toxics in toxic amounts.” While EPA currently relies a small number (one cladoceran, one fish, one plant species) for assessing toxicity and other groups of organisms have been identified as potential test species. Additional methods are needed to ensure that the NPDES WET program has new tools to assess whether effluents or waters comply with this “no toxics” provision of the CWA.
Description:
EPA currently has toxicity testing methods for effluent and ambient testing that were promulgated under the Clean Water Act Part 136. The promulgated freshwater methods for acute lethality include cladocerans (Daphnia magna, D. pulex, Ceriodaphnia dubia) and three fish species (fathead minnow (Pimephales promelas), rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss), and brown trout (Salvelinus fontinalis)). The short-term chronic freshwater methods that are promulgated include three species, a cladoceran (C. dubia), the fathead minnow (P. promelas), and a green alga (Raphidocelis subcapitata). Beginning in 2019, EPA’s Office of Research and Development (ORD) has begun to focus on additional species or test methods to add to the suite of freshwater test species to provide additional options for species sensitivity. In the first stage, EPA will be developing protocols for the short-term chronic test with the cladoceran, D. magna, and acute and short-term chronic test protocols for the freshwater mussel (fatmucket, Lampsilis siliquoidea). Both the Duluth and Cincinnati laboratories within the Office of Research and Development will be developing these test protocols and refining the various test conditions for each species within the EPA laboratories. These standardized procedures will aid in the detection of both known and unknown chemical and biological contaminants in wastewater and ambient water in support of EPA’s Office of Water, EPA regions, State and others. The second phase includes plans to develop effluent and ambient water protocols for additional species, such as acute and short-term methods for the mayflies, amphipods, midges, a short-term procedure using trout, and possibly another plant species. In this presentation, we will outline the general study plans for the daphnids and the mussels. We will discuss options for joining a listserv (or a similar system) to communicate the methods and to incorporate the public review of the methods during this development stage