Environmental▼News provide basic hazard, safety, and exposure information; risk assessment data for human health and the environment; and statements on how risks associated with the substance’s use are being managed. For 80% of all substances, the EC expects that registration will suffice. Chemicals produced in higher volumes, as well as substances of very high concern, will be subject to safety evaluations and subsequent authorization for specific uses by EU regulators. The latter group includes chemicals that are potentially carcinogenic, mutagenic, reproductive toxicants, persistent, or bioaccumulative. Although weakened some since a white paper proposal was issued in 2001 (Environ. Sci. Technol. 2001, 35, 185A), the basic framework is still there, says Joel Tickner, a research professor with the Lowell Center for Sustainable Production at the University of Massachusetts. The new legislation offers registration exemptions to polymers and intermediates used as raw materials in the manufacturing process. Likewise, forced phase outs and substitutions of the most hazardous chemicals under the authorization step have been weakened, notes Michael Warhurst, a chemical policy analyst for the World Wide Fund for Nature, an environmental group. Industry on both sides of the Atlantic has raised concerns with
the legislation, and the U.S. Department of Commerce is analyzing the text for possible trade barriers and is encouraging U.S. companies to comment on the legislation. Of primary concern is the workability and cost of the new system. The EC estimates direct costs of registration and testing at ¤3.6 billion, with indirect costs reaching into the range of ¤14–26 billion by 2020. Industry estimates, however, are far higher, and the EC is revising its figures to address this gap, says Per Haugaard, a spokesperson for the EC’s enterprise directorate. “We’re also trying to quantify the actual benefits as a result of improved environmental and health protections.” Annemaria Ojanperä, a communications manager with the European Chemical Industry Council, warns that the new legislation will not only affect the chemical industry, but likely will cascade down to “virtually all sectors of the economy,” which are supplied by the chemical industry. Another big issue, according to Joe Mayhew, vice president of regulatory policy for the American Chemistry Council, is just how chemicals contained in finished products being imported into Europe will be treated. Because many of these substances will have to be registered in Europe, environmentalists want the REACH requirements to apply to imported products containing them as well.
Natural iron and shore development off Australian coast linked to toxic blooms Blooms of toxic cyanobacteria that threaten the waters off Australia’s Queensland coast, including portions of the Great Barrier Reef, have been linked to land development along the coast by a team of environmental chemists and biologists. A detailed understanding of iron cycling and photochemistry was crucial to confirming this link, according to one of the project team leaders, University of New South Wales environmental chemist David Waite.
As a result of this linkage, the Australian government at the federal, regional, and local level is considering changes in land management. “It is through the adoption of best practice environmental management of our vitally important land-based activities that we can commence controlling the causative factors associated with [cyanobacteria] outbreaks,” Environment Minister Dean Wells, wrote in a management strategy document published last August.
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Mayhew, however, says “this is really reaching way beyond substances, and we’ve suggested [the EC] leave that out of the rule.” Likewise, “we’d much prefer a risk-based list rather than a hazardbased list” of chemicals subject to authorization, Mayhew adds. The EU approach follows the precautionary principle, with high-volume chemicals automatically subject to closer scrutiny. The EC system “is a one-size-fits-all approach,” says Mayhew, “and we’re more inclined to the tiered U.S. approach,” which requires a smaller amount of information for the inventory process, with various models then applied to determine which specific chemicals and uses require further scrutiny. Because of potential challenges before the World Trade Organization, the EC is “working very closely with our American counterparts, both on the industrial side and on the administration side to ensure that their concerns are taken into account to the greatest extent possible,” Haugaard says. The EC expects to present its final proposal by fall, according to Haugaard, at which point the legislation will move on to the EU member states and European Parliament for further discussion. For more information, go to http://europa.eu.int/comm/ enterprise/chemicals/chempol/ whitepaper/reach.htm. —KRIS CHRISTEN
In the past five years, blooms of Lyngbya majuscula have increased off the Queensland coast. Lyngbya, which looks like seaweed, causes severe skin rashes and respiratory problems for fisherman and others who come into contact with it. The blooms, which can cover over one square kilometer of ocean, also damage fish and endanger green turtles and dugongs—passive marine mammals related to manatees. During this time, development along Australia’s gold coast has also increased—coastal swamplands have been drained to make room for seafront housing developments with canal access for
Blooms of the toxic cyanobacteria Lyngbya majuscula look like seaweed but can cause severe skin rashes and respiratory problems in humans and endanger sea animals.
“This is a fascinating hypothesis,” says David Hutchins from the University of Delaware. Iron has been suggested before as a control on the growth of toxic blooms, but there wasn’t enough known about iron photochemistry to develop the hypothesis, he says. Iron is known to be important to the fertility of ocean waters, but not coastal waters, says U.S. EPA photochemist Richard Zepp. This is one of the first studies to show its importance in coastal waters, he says. In ocean waters, terrestrial dusts have been posited as a source of iron. But dusts don’t appear to be the source of Queensland’s problems, says Waite. Typically, when rivers join the sea with its high pH of 8.1, iron(III) rapidly forms insoluble oxides (FeOOH) that are relatively unavailable to algae. Waite and doctoral student Andrew Rose found evidence that organic matter running off the land as result of coastal de-
velopment complexes with the iron and keeps it in solution. Sunlight also plays a role—either directly or indirectly. In direct photolysis, the light activates the organic matter, which reduces the metal to iron(II). The indirect mechanism begins with sunlight exciting the organic compounds, which reduce oxygen to superoxide. This powerful redox agent can reduce iron(III) to iron(II). Waite presented these results at the American Chemical Society meeting in March. Rose’s studies have shown that without organic matter, iron is oxidized and precipitates out in as little as four minutes but with the organic ligand, iron lasts for several hours in aerated water. Photochemical processes extend the time that iron is in the dissolved form even further. “We think that in coastal environments, this time is crucial,” says Rose. In Queensland’s coastal waters, Lyngbya blooms appear to occur after heavy rains, calm weather conditions during which sunlight penetrates deeper into the water column, and warm seawater (>23 °C). Waters near the blooms have higher humic acid concentrations than those away from the blooms. Laboratory work using field samples indicates that soils vary in their effect on Lyngbya. The greatest growth response was observed when soil extracts from pine plantations were combined with highiron sediments. Rose has also showed that organic extracts from cleared pine plantations have the greatest iron-complexing strength in the lab. Although Australia is known for it’s iron-rich soils, these effects are probably not confined to Australia, says William Dennison, director of the University of Maryland’s Center for Environmental Science in Cambridge, Md. Similar processes may be taking place in other tropical areas such as Florida. L. majuscula has also been identified in Hawaii, Florida, the Bahamas, the Philippines, and Mozambique. —REBECCA RENNER
News Briefs Congress restores STAR The U.S. Congress approved $9.75 million this year for EPA’s Science to Achieve Results (STAR), the only federally supported fellowship program aimed at graduate students in the environmental sciences and policy areas. EPA had initially suspended STAR in February 2002 soon after President Bush released his proposed budget for the 2003 Fiscal Year, which would have eliminated STAR. The program’s reinstatement was the focus of a letterwriting campaign to Congress by the National Council for Science and the Environment, a nonprofit group. The campaign urged lawmakers to maintain STAR and provide additional funds to address the halt in fellowships in 2002. For more information, go to http://es.epa.gov/ ncer/grants.
Hazardous dust? Each gram of dust taken from 100 households in the United Kingdom contained, on average, about 0.5 milligrams of hazardous chemicals from five key chemical groups, according to new research from Greenpeace. A series of laboratory analyses performed by LGC Limited of the United Kingdom, GALAB of Germany, and RIVO, the Netherlands Institute for Fisheries Research, showed that all of the U.K. samples contained phthalates, brominated flame retardants, and organotin compounds. More than 75% also contained nonylphenol and short-chain chlorinated paraffins, according to the study, which was carried out under the auspices of Greenpeace Research Laboratories at the University of Exeter. To see a copy of the report, go to www.greenpeace.to/pdfs/ housedust_uk_2003.pdf.
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PHOTODISC
TURTLE TRAX; WWW.TURTLES.ORG
boats, and tree farms with accompanying clear cutting have been increasing. Cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, are nitrogen-fixing organisms that need relatively large amounts of iron because it is an essential component in the enzymes that fix the nitrogen. “Our hypothesis, by analogy with the open oceans, is that iron availability is potentially a driver for these blooms,” says Waite.
