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Assessing the impact of pollution on aquatic systems at a global and regional level
Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228 www.elsevier.com/locate/marenvrev
Assessing the impact of pollution on aquatic systems at a global and regional level Laurence D. Mee*, Martin Bloxham Environmental Policy Unit, Plymouth Environmental Research Centre, University of Plymouth, Drake Circus, Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK
Abstract In developing a methodology for the ongoing Global International Waters Assessment, major gaps have become apparent in our ability to make comparative assessments of pollution. A pragmatic impacts scoping methodology has been developed and tested. A more effective assessment protocol however, requires a better knowledge of the relationship between pollution sources and biological effects with less reliance on chemical monitoring. # 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Baseline studies; Biomonitoring; Ecosystem management; Effects; Environmental impact; Integrated assessment; Monitoring; Sources
1. Introduction The growing awareness of a decline in the state of the world’s marine and coastal environments has led to the establishment of a number of national and international programmes and funding mechanisms designed to respond to the perceived threats. With limited financial resources, these programmes have to make tough choices for allocating funds and often request support from scientists for objective comparable assessments. The present article examines how an assessment scheme was developed and tested for the Global International Waters Assessment (GIWA).
2. Aims GIWA was conceived as a means for providing the Global Environment Facility with objective strategic guidance for prioritising its interventions in its US$700 mil* Corresponding author. Tel.: +44-1752-233719; fax: +44-1752-233039. E-mail address: [email protected] (L.D. Mee). 0141-1136/02/$ - see front matter # 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S0141-1136(02)00126-5
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lion International Waters Focal Area (Pernetta & Mee, 1998). This requires a holistic assessment of the state of freshwater catchments and their associated marine areas globally, and an analysis of the socio-economic causes of the key issues in the most impacted areas. The goal is to examine 22 predefined issues within five major concerns throughout 66 catchments covering the entire surface of the planet. The concerns and related issues are: Freshwater shortage: (1) Modification of stream flow, (2) Pollution of existing supplies, (3) Changes in the water table; Pollution: (4) Microbiological pollution, (5) Eutrophication, (6) Chemical pollution, (7) Suspended solids, (8) Solid wastes, (9) Thermal, (10) Radionuclides, (11) Spills; Habitat and community modification: (12) Loss of ecosystems or ecotones, (13) Modification of ecosystems or ecotones, including community structure and/or species composition; Unsustainable exploitation of fisheries and other living resources: (14) Overexploitation, (15) Excessive bycatch and discards: (16) Destructive fishing practices, (17) Decreased viability of stocks through contamination and disease, (18) Impact on biological and genetic diversity; and Global change: (19) Changes in hydrological cycle and ocean circulation, (20) Sea level change, (21) Increased UV-B radiation as a result of ozone depletion, (22) Changes in ocean CO2 source/sink function. As part of the development of the GIWA methodology, we examined and tested integrated regionally based approaches for assessing all predefined issues affecting the aquatic environment.
3. Methodology The methodology developed for trial application in three catchments consisted of: (a) scoping exercise, to determine which of the major issues are to be afforded highest priority; (b) detailed impacts assessment of high priority issues; and (c) causal chain analysis to examine the physical, social and economic root causes of identified problems. The starting point for this assessment is a scoping exercise. This involves a value judgement of the severity of each issue within chosen natural geographical boundaries. Such judgement may focus on the damage to the integrity of ecosystems, communities or even individuals (ecocentric perspective), or upon immediate effects to the human economy, health and welfare (approximating to an anthropocentric perspective). For GIWA purposes these are referred to as ‘environmental impacts’ and ‘socio-economic impacts’. The two concepts are not mutually exclusive (Oksa-
L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228
225
nen, 1997) but it was considered convenient to examine impacts from both perspectives and to present the results as simple numerical scores. This approach required culturally unbiased uniform criteria for assessing whether, a specific issue causes no known impact (score 0), slight (1), moderate (2) or severe (3). Over 80 specialists from 20 countries were consulted in the development of the environmental impact criteria. This work revealed important gaps in our scientific knowledge. The main difficulty was to find indicators that were unambiguous and ubiquitous. Fig. 1 illustrates criteria developed for score=2 for environmental impacts from chemical pollution. The chemical pollution criteria proved particularly difficult to develop and are indicative of the unsatisfactory nature of current pollution impact indicators. They are based on: the use of existing regional quality criteria derived from toxicity testing, combined with results of chemical monitoring,
Fig. 1. The development of environmental impact scoping criteria.
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L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228
human health proxies, community-level effects, and application of the precautionary approach for high risk industrial processes or agrochemical applications (see Mee, 1996). It is unfortunate that the limited worldwide use of pollution effects methodologies does not allow their application as comparative indicators. Though it was much easier to develop assessment criteria for most other pollutant classes, in the case of microbiological pollution there is very little information regarding non-human effects and an assessment could only be made using human health proxies. This is another major gap in our knowledge base. Socio-economic criteria (developed by CSERGE, University of East Anglia) were based upon human welfare impacts, human health impacts and economic costs incurred from the particular issue and will be described elsewhere. Detailed impacts and causal chain methodologies are currently being tested. An important step was to facilitate the estimation of sources of pollution through the production of an updated electronic version of the WHO Rapid Assessment Methodology (Economopoulas, 1993).
4. Results The scoping methodology has been tested by expert teams in the Baltic, Gulf of Thailand and Benguela system. Results summarising current perceptions are given in Fig. 2. In the three test systems, chemical pollution, though important, was only regarding as an issue of highest priority in the Baltic. In general, greater concern was expressed for habitat loss and overfishing, a conclusion also reached in the latest study of GESAMP (2001). The scoping methodology also includes an exercise to examine the likelihood of improvement in each of the issues over a 20-year period based upon actual trends, preventative and remedial actions. Regions consulted, consider improvements in chemical pollution as ‘likely’ or ‘highly likely’ but are less optimistic with most other pollutant classes.
5. Discussion and conclusions The results of the trial studies suggest that indicator-based scoping studies will be useful tools for international priority setting as the use of widely agreed criteria limits cultural bias in value judgements. The difficulty in development of the criteria for chemical pollution highlights current gaps in knowledge of pollution effects: current studies are for limited geographical areas, species or communities, there are insufficient comparable studies of impacts at the population level, and there are few comparable studies of the in-situ effects of multiple contaminants and their residues.
L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228 Fig. 2. Summary of scores from the scoping exercises in test regions. Issue numbers correspond to the descriptors in the introductory section of the test. 227
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L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228
As a consequence, most monitoring and regulation systems still rely heavily on the outmoded approach of assumed no effect levels and monitoring of a limited suite of chemical contaminants. The major limitation of the scoping studies is that they do not lead to a predictive assessment. Analysis of the relationship between social and economic pressures causing environmental problems and ecological impacts should offer better perspectives for a more precautionary approach to policymaking with a decreased reliance on routine monitoring. A successful early application of this strategy was the Black Sea mussel-watch (Moore et al., 1999). This correlated lysosomal alterations with industrial and domestic effluent loadings estimated by the Rapid Assessment Methodology. More large-scale studies will be required however, to provide regulators with robust tools that enable them to move from a reactive to an anticipatory approach.
Acknowledgements The authors express appreciation to the GIWA Secretariat for their support during this work. The full adopted GIWA methodology and test results are available on http://www.giwa.net.
References Economopoulas, A. P. (1993). Assessment of sources of air, water and land pollution: a guide to rapid source inventory techniques and their use in formulating environmental control strategies. Part one: rapid inventory technique in environmental pollution. Geneva: WHO. GESAMP (IMO/FAO/UNESCO-IOC/WMO/WHO/IAEA/UN/UNEP Joint Group of Experts on the Scientific Aspects of Marine Environmental Protection). (2001). Protecting the oceans from land-based activities land-based sources and activities affecting the quality and uses of the marine, coastal and associated freshwater environment. Rep. Stud. GESAMP no. 71. Mee, L. D. (1996). Scientific methods and the precautionary principle. In E. Hey, & D. Freestone (Eds.), The precautionary principle and international law (pp. 109–131). Amsterdam: Kluwer Law International. Moore, M. N., Wade, T., Wedderburn, R. J., Lowe, D. M., Balashov, G., Buyukgungor, H., Daurova, Y., Denga, Y., Kostylev, E., Mihnea, P. E., Moncheva, S., Tabagari, S., Ciocan, C., Ozcoc, H., & Depledge, M. H. (1999). The UNESCO/IOC ‘‘Black Sea Mussel Watch Pilot Study’’: biological effects and contaminant residues. In L. D. Mee, & G. Topping (Eds.), Black sea pollution assessment (pp. 279– 292). New York: UN Publications. Oksanen, M. (1997). The moral value of biodiversity. Ambio, 26(8), 537–540. Pernetta, J. C., & Mee, L. D. (1998). The Global International Waters Assessment. In ACOPS (Ed.) Towards enhanced ocean security into the third millennium (pp. 201–221). Advisory Committee on the Protection of the Sea, London.
Assessing the impact of pollution on aquatic systems at a global and regional level Laurence D. Mee*, Martin Bloxham Environmental Policy Unit, Plymouth Environmental Research Centre, University of Plymouth, Drake Circus, Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK
Abstract In developing a methodology for the ongoing Global International Waters Assessment, major gaps have become apparent in our ability to make comparative assessments of pollution. A pragmatic impacts scoping methodology has been developed and tested. A more effective assessment protocol however, requires a better knowledge of the relationship between pollution sources and biological effects with less reliance on chemical monitoring. # 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Baseline studies; Biomonitoring; Ecosystem management; Effects; Environmental impact; Integrated assessment; Monitoring; Sources
1. Introduction The growing awareness of a decline in the state of the world’s marine and coastal environments has led to the establishment of a number of national and international programmes and funding mechanisms designed to respond to the perceived threats. With limited financial resources, these programmes have to make tough choices for allocating funds and often request support from scientists for objective comparable assessments. The present article examines how an assessment scheme was developed and tested for the Global International Waters Assessment (GIWA).
2. Aims GIWA was conceived as a means for providing the Global Environment Facility with objective strategic guidance for prioritising its interventions in its US$700 mil* Corresponding author. Tel.: +44-1752-233719; fax: +44-1752-233039. E-mail address: [email protected] (L.D. Mee). 0141-1136/02/$ - see front matter # 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S0141-1136(02)00126-5
224
L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228
lion International Waters Focal Area (Pernetta & Mee, 1998). This requires a holistic assessment of the state of freshwater catchments and their associated marine areas globally, and an analysis of the socio-economic causes of the key issues in the most impacted areas. The goal is to examine 22 predefined issues within five major concerns throughout 66 catchments covering the entire surface of the planet. The concerns and related issues are: Freshwater shortage: (1) Modification of stream flow, (2) Pollution of existing supplies, (3) Changes in the water table; Pollution: (4) Microbiological pollution, (5) Eutrophication, (6) Chemical pollution, (7) Suspended solids, (8) Solid wastes, (9) Thermal, (10) Radionuclides, (11) Spills; Habitat and community modification: (12) Loss of ecosystems or ecotones, (13) Modification of ecosystems or ecotones, including community structure and/or species composition; Unsustainable exploitation of fisheries and other living resources: (14) Overexploitation, (15) Excessive bycatch and discards: (16) Destructive fishing practices, (17) Decreased viability of stocks through contamination and disease, (18) Impact on biological and genetic diversity; and Global change: (19) Changes in hydrological cycle and ocean circulation, (20) Sea level change, (21) Increased UV-B radiation as a result of ozone depletion, (22) Changes in ocean CO2 source/sink function. As part of the development of the GIWA methodology, we examined and tested integrated regionally based approaches for assessing all predefined issues affecting the aquatic environment.
3. Methodology The methodology developed for trial application in three catchments consisted of: (a) scoping exercise, to determine which of the major issues are to be afforded highest priority; (b) detailed impacts assessment of high priority issues; and (c) causal chain analysis to examine the physical, social and economic root causes of identified problems. The starting point for this assessment is a scoping exercise. This involves a value judgement of the severity of each issue within chosen natural geographical boundaries. Such judgement may focus on the damage to the integrity of ecosystems, communities or even individuals (ecocentric perspective), or upon immediate effects to the human economy, health and welfare (approximating to an anthropocentric perspective). For GIWA purposes these are referred to as ‘environmental impacts’ and ‘socio-economic impacts’. The two concepts are not mutually exclusive (Oksa-
L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228
225
nen, 1997) but it was considered convenient to examine impacts from both perspectives and to present the results as simple numerical scores. This approach required culturally unbiased uniform criteria for assessing whether, a specific issue causes no known impact (score 0), slight (1), moderate (2) or severe (3). Over 80 specialists from 20 countries were consulted in the development of the environmental impact criteria. This work revealed important gaps in our scientific knowledge. The main difficulty was to find indicators that were unambiguous and ubiquitous. Fig. 1 illustrates criteria developed for score=2 for environmental impacts from chemical pollution. The chemical pollution criteria proved particularly difficult to develop and are indicative of the unsatisfactory nature of current pollution impact indicators. They are based on: the use of existing regional quality criteria derived from toxicity testing, combined with results of chemical monitoring,
Fig. 1. The development of environmental impact scoping criteria.
226
L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228
human health proxies, community-level effects, and application of the precautionary approach for high risk industrial processes or agrochemical applications (see Mee, 1996). It is unfortunate that the limited worldwide use of pollution effects methodologies does not allow their application as comparative indicators. Though it was much easier to develop assessment criteria for most other pollutant classes, in the case of microbiological pollution there is very little information regarding non-human effects and an assessment could only be made using human health proxies. This is another major gap in our knowledge base. Socio-economic criteria (developed by CSERGE, University of East Anglia) were based upon human welfare impacts, human health impacts and economic costs incurred from the particular issue and will be described elsewhere. Detailed impacts and causal chain methodologies are currently being tested. An important step was to facilitate the estimation of sources of pollution through the production of an updated electronic version of the WHO Rapid Assessment Methodology (Economopoulas, 1993).
4. Results The scoping methodology has been tested by expert teams in the Baltic, Gulf of Thailand and Benguela system. Results summarising current perceptions are given in Fig. 2. In the three test systems, chemical pollution, though important, was only regarding as an issue of highest priority in the Baltic. In general, greater concern was expressed for habitat loss and overfishing, a conclusion also reached in the latest study of GESAMP (2001). The scoping methodology also includes an exercise to examine the likelihood of improvement in each of the issues over a 20-year period based upon actual trends, preventative and remedial actions. Regions consulted, consider improvements in chemical pollution as ‘likely’ or ‘highly likely’ but are less optimistic with most other pollutant classes.
5. Discussion and conclusions The results of the trial studies suggest that indicator-based scoping studies will be useful tools for international priority setting as the use of widely agreed criteria limits cultural bias in value judgements. The difficulty in development of the criteria for chemical pollution highlights current gaps in knowledge of pollution effects: current studies are for limited geographical areas, species or communities, there are insufficient comparable studies of impacts at the population level, and there are few comparable studies of the in-situ effects of multiple contaminants and their residues.
L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228 Fig. 2. Summary of scores from the scoping exercises in test regions. Issue numbers correspond to the descriptors in the introductory section of the test. 227
228
L.D. Mee, M. Bloxham / Marine Environmental Research 54 (2002) 223–228
As a consequence, most monitoring and regulation systems still rely heavily on the outmoded approach of assumed no effect levels and monitoring of a limited suite of chemical contaminants. The major limitation of the scoping studies is that they do not lead to a predictive assessment. Analysis of the relationship between social and economic pressures causing environmental problems and ecological impacts should offer better perspectives for a more precautionary approach to policymaking with a decreased reliance on routine monitoring. A successful early application of this strategy was the Black Sea mussel-watch (Moore et al., 1999). This correlated lysosomal alterations with industrial and domestic effluent loadings estimated by the Rapid Assessment Methodology. More large-scale studies will be required however, to provide regulators with robust tools that enable them to move from a reactive to an anticipatory approach.
Acknowledgements The authors express appreciation to the GIWA Secretariat for their support during this work. The full adopted GIWA methodology and test results are available on http://www.giwa.net.
References Economopoulas, A. P. (1993). Assessment of sources of air, water and land pollution: a guide to rapid source inventory techniques and their use in formulating environmental control strategies. Part one: rapid inventory technique in environmental pollution. Geneva: WHO. GESAMP (IMO/FAO/UNESCO-IOC/WMO/WHO/IAEA/UN/UNEP Joint Group of Experts on the Scientific Aspects of Marine Environmental Protection). (2001). Protecting the oceans from land-based activities land-based sources and activities affecting the quality and uses of the marine, coastal and associated freshwater environment. Rep. Stud. GESAMP no. 71. Mee, L. D. (1996). Scientific methods and the precautionary principle. In E. Hey, & D. Freestone (Eds.), The precautionary principle and international law (pp. 109–131). Amsterdam: Kluwer Law International. Moore, M. N., Wade, T., Wedderburn, R. J., Lowe, D. M., Balashov, G., Buyukgungor, H., Daurova, Y., Denga, Y., Kostylev, E., Mihnea, P. E., Moncheva, S., Tabagari, S., Ciocan, C., Ozcoc, H., & Depledge, M. H. (1999). The UNESCO/IOC ‘‘Black Sea Mussel Watch Pilot Study’’: biological effects and contaminant residues. In L. D. Mee, & G. Topping (Eds.), Black sea pollution assessment (pp. 279– 292). New York: UN Publications. Oksanen, M. (1997). The moral value of biodiversity. Ambio, 26(8), 537–540. Pernetta, J. C., & Mee, L. D. (1998). The Global International Waters Assessment. In ACOPS (Ed.) Towards enhanced ocean security into the third millennium (pp. 201–221). Advisory Committee on the Protection of the Sea, London.