The RiBaTox web tool: selecting methods to assess and manage the diverse problem of chemical pollution in surface waters

Abstract

Chemical pollution of water bodies is a complex problem around the globe. When described by the extremes of the range of problem definitions, water bodies can be chemically polluted by a single compound that is emitted from a point source or an incidental spill, or by chronic diffuse emissions from local and upstream land uses. The resulting mixture exposures can vary in space and time, e.g. due to the use of pesticides in the crop growing season. The environmental management objectives are commonly to protect and restore surface waters against human influences. Currently, chemical pollution is globally judged for a selected set of compounds, by judging each of these individually in comparison with protective environmental quality standards. Research has provided a novel assessment paradigm (solution-focused risk assessment) and novel data, measurement methods and models to improve on current practices. Their adoption and application require establishing novel linkages between the diverse problem definitions and the novel approaches. That would assist water quality professionals to select the most effective option or options to protect and restore water quality. The present paper introduces the RiBaTox (River Basin Specific Toxicants assessment and management) web tool. It consists of short descriptions of the novel approaches (made available as Additional file 1) and a decision tree for end-users to select those. The overview of novel approaches collated in RiBaTox is relevant for end-users ranging from local water quality experts up till strategic policy developers. Although RiBaTox was developed in the context of European water quality problems, the methods provided by RiBaTox are relevant for users from (inter)national to local scales. This paper is part of a series of Policy Briefs from the EU-FP7 project SOLUTIONS (http://www.solut ions-proje ct.eu), which provide backgrounds on chemical pollution of surface waters and policy practices and proposed improvements.

Exploring the ‘solution space’ is key: SOLUTIONS recommends an early-stage assessment of options to protect and restore water quality against chemical pollution

“…Given the conceptual framework of Fig. 1 and the tools and services to characterize water quality problems [20], we aimed to systematically collate abatement techniques and management options and strategies and to make the results available for re-use by others encountering a similar chemical pollution problem. Systematic storage of those-with or without evaluating them-enables a whole community of users to retrieve collated options and experiences, and thus to explore a wide array of options.…”

Strengthen the European collaborative environmental research to meet European policy goals for achieving a sustainable, non-toxic environment

“…The early consideration of possible responses is supported by a database on technical abatement options [44] and a systematic evaluation of non-technical abatement options. SOLUTIONS-focused assessment of multiple stressors is supported by the SOLUTIONS' Tools and Services for River Basin Toxicants Assessment and Management accessible through the web-based guidance tool RiBa-Tox (https ://solut ions.marvi n.vito.be/ [29]) and by a living database architecture for the exchange of chemical and effect-based monitoring data [30]. Moreover, a scenario analysis tool developed by MARS provides indications on how stressor intensity and ecological status will develop under given scenarios of human impact at the European scale and broken down to more than 100,000 sub-catchments in Europe (https ://mars-proje ct-sat.…”

“…It has been written on the basis of the experience of the large EU-funded projects SOLUTIONS, MARS and GLOBA-QUA. The extensive scientific results of the three projects are documented in about 200 publications each, accessible via the websites https ://www.solut ions-proje ct.eu/, http://www.mars-proje ct.eu/, http://www.globa quaproje ct.eu/en/home/, and have been exploited to derive a series of policy briefs published in this journal [21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32]. We made no attempts to summarize these results here but drew conclusions for the requirement of future European research under systematic involvement of major stakeholders using a small selection of general achievements of the projects to underline these conclusions.…”

Increase coherence, cooperation and cross-compliance of regulations on chemicals and water quality

“…The SOLUTIONS project used the solutions-focused approach based on the Conceptual Framework to achieve significant progress in providing science-based and application-ready methods related to protection, monitoring, modelling and abatement of CEC, whilst also evaluating future societal developments and emerging (mixture) risk to anticipate on measures needed to avoid future damage. The results of the SOLUTIONS project can be found at RiBaTox [17], accessible at https ://solut ions.marvi n.vito. be/, which helps to select and use SOLUTIONS Tools and Services that relate to the diversity of water-related challenges.…”