Using sludge on arable land - effect based levels and long-term accumulation for certain organic pollutants

Sternbeck, John; Diana, Line; Gustavson, Kim; Frankki, Sofia

doi:10.6027/tn2011-506

Cited by 1 publication

(5 citation statements)

References 16 publications

(20 reference statements)

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“…The latter was based on the mathematical relationships described in the European Chemicals Bureau Technical Guidance Document (TGD) on Risk Assessment (ECB 2003) and commonly used in RA studies of land application of sewage sludge (VKM 2009;Diana et al 2011;Sternbeck et al 2013). The USEtox models were used to obtain characterisation factors (CFs), which were then applied to the emissions of chemical contaminants resulting from the application of sludge to agricultural land.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recent risk assessment studies in the Nordic countries concluded that the application of sewage sludge to agricultural land generally constitutes a low risk to consumers (Diana et al 2011;Sternbeck et al 2013;VKM 2009). Yet, there has been considerable opposition against the practice of land application.…”

Section: Sensitivity Towards Assumptions and Problem Framingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Human health EFs and BCFs (both for root vegetables and leafy vegetables) were available in the USEtox databases (USEtox 1.01 and USEtox 2.0) for 15 out of the 62 metals for which monitoring data were available. For organic contaminants, human health EFs were also taken from the USEtox databases (USEtox 1.01 or USEtox 2.0, depending on the model variant), whereas BCFs were taken from Diana et al (2011). The availability of EFs and BCFs for organic contaminants is summarised in Fig.…”

Section: Data Sources and Data Availabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…VKM (2009) predicted that the accumulation of cadmium (Cd) and mercury (Hg) might result in an undesirable increase in human dietary intake, whereas Sternbeck et al (2013) found that cadmium (Cd), copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn) are contaminants that come closest to effect thresholds. The occurrence of organic contaminants in sewage sludge was generally predicted not to be of concern to either human health or the environment (VKM 2009;Diana et al 2011;Sternbeck et al 2013). VKM (2009) covered a range of organic contaminants and pharmaceuticals and found that only linear alkylbenzene sulfonate (LAS) and octylphenols and nonylphenols might initially exceed effect levels regarding ecotoxicity in agricultural soil but degrade rapidly to levels below concern.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Among these studies were a study commissioned by the Norwegian Food Safety Authority and conducted by the Norwegian Scientific Committee for Food Safety (VKM 2009), a study commissioned by the Nordic Council of Ministers (Diana et al 2011) and a study commissioned by the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency and the Swedish Chemicals Agency (Sternbeck et al 2013). Repeated application of sewage sludge was predicted to lead to an increase in soil concentrations of most of the examined metals (VKM 2009;Sternbeck et al 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Estimating human toxicity potential of land application of sewage sludge: the effect of modelling choices

Harder

Peters

Svanström

et al. 2016

Int J Life Cycle Assess

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Purpose Many municipalities are facing increasing pressure to adapt solid waste and wastewater management infrastructures in order to better close nutrient cycles. The focus of this study is on the estimation of the human toxicity potential associated with chemical contaminants released upon the application of sewage sludge to agricultural land. More specifically, this study investigated the effect of modelling choices regarding fate and exposure assessment. Methods Monitoring data were collected for contaminants present in the sewage sludge from the wastewater treatment plant in Gothenburg and from other municipal wastewater treatment plants in Sweden. Based on these monitoring data, an overall burden of disease was estimated using characterisation factors taken from the USEtox models (versions 1.01 and 2.0). For the exposure through vegetables, an alternative life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) model was developed. The intake fractions thus obtained were used in combination with human health effect factors taken from the USEtox 2.0 database. The model results were compared with the USEtox models, and whether these two versions of the USEtox model provide significantly different results was also examined. The potential relevance of accidental ingestion of sludge was also considered.Results and discussion The different LCIA models provided burden of disease estimates that differed from one another for individual contaminants (up to five orders of magnitude). The aggregated burdens of disease (i.e. sum for all contaminants considered in this study) estimated through different model variants, however, were of the same order of magnitude. For both metals and organic contaminants, only a small set of contaminants was found to make significant contributions to the aggregate burden of disease. However, it is uncertain whether the 15 metals and 106 organic contaminants covered by this study are those of greatest health significance of all contaminants potentially present in sewage sludge. Conclusions and recommendationsThe results of this study indicate that the technical information provided by the various approaches to modelling human toxicity in life cycle assessment (LCA) in the context of land application of sewage sludge management is consistent on the whole. However, given the uncertainties associated with the assessment of human toxicity in LCA, it is important to also contemplate the extent to which LCA in general is capable of informing the sewage sludge debate when it comes to human toxicity and possibly also other indicators. Future research could focus on identifying which types of questions of interest in the context of sewage management can be answered by LCA and which cannot.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Sensitivity Towards Assumptions and Problem Framingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Data Sources and Data Availabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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