Using emerging science to inform risk characterizations for wildlife within current regulatory frameworks.

Many jurisdictions have regulatory frameworks that seek to reduce the effects of environmental exposures of anthropogenic chemicals on terrestrial wildlife (i.e., mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians). The frameworks apply for new and existing chemicals, including pesticides (prospective assessments), and to environmental contamination from releases (retrospective risk assessments). Relatively recently, there have been many scientific advances that could improve risk estimates for wildlife. Here, we briefly describe current regulations from North America (United States and Canada) and from Europe that include risk assessments for wildlife to ascertain whether they are conducive to the use of emerging science and new methods. We also provide examples where new and emerging science may be used to improve wildlife risk characterization and identify areas in need of future research. Integr Environ Assess Manag 2024;20:765-779. © 2024 His Majesty the King in Right of Canada and The Authors. Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management © 2024 Society of Environmental Toxicology & Chemistry (SETAC). Reproduced with the permission of the Minister of Environment and Climate Change Canada. This article has been contributed to by U.S. Government employees and their work is in the public domain in the USA.

Furthering the derivation of predictive wildlife toxicity reference values for use in soil cleanup decisions.

The development of media-specific ecological values for risk assessment includes the derivation of acceptable levels of exposure for terrestrial wildlife (e.g., birds, mammals, reptiles, and amphibians). Although the derivation and subsequent application of these values can be used for screening purposes, there is a need to identify toxicological effects thresholds specifically for making remedial decisions at individual contaminated sites. A workshop was held in the fall of 2012 to evaluate existing methods and recent scientific developments for refining ecological soil screening levels (Eco-SSLs) and improving the derivation of site-specific ecological soil clean-up values for metals (Eco-SCVs). This included a focused session on the development and derivation of toxicity reference values (TRVs) for terrestrial wildlife. Topics that were examined included: methods for toxicological endpoint selection, techniques for dose-response assessment, approaches for cross-species extrapolation, and tools to incorporate environmental factors (e.g., metal bioavailability and chemistry) into a reference value. The workgroup also made recommendations to risk assessors and regulators on how to incorporate site-specific wildlife life history and toxicity information into the derivation of TRVs to be used in the further development of soil cleanup levels.