April 24, 1997 EPA-SAB-EC-LTR-97-006 Honorable Fred Hansen Deputy Administrator U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 401 M Street, SW Washington, DC 20460 Subject: Second Report from the Science Advisory Board (SAB) Lookout Panel: Meeting with OPP managers Dear Mr. Hansen: The purpose of this letter is to summarize the third experiment of the SAB's Executive Committee in carrying out the function of a Lookout Panel for the Agency, in response to your July 1995 request. This experiment differed from the previous two experiments in that managers from within a program office supplied much of the expertise. Such an approach allows the program office to benefit in the lookout panel process, which is likely to provide much more benefit to the program than merely responding to the outputs of a panel. This approach seemed a particularly appropriate way of responding to your request that we serve as ambassadors to the Agency on futures and communicate enthusiasm for thinking about the future as the Agency goes about its business of protecting the public health and the environment. A summary of this discussion is contained in Attachment A. We believe this has been the most successful of the experiments so far. The discussion was rich in ideas, most of which came from the program office participants in response to questions from the SAB members. Many of the issues raised could be recognized only by those with experience in the pesticide area. The one limitation of the approach is that it is probably not the best way to uncover issues that are truly "beyond the horizon". For that reason, we may wish to combine an approach similar to this with some other approaches that may be more oriented to ------- new, as yet unthought-of problems. However, we believe that the benefits of this approach are high and probably could not be attained by an approach designed specifically to elicit unthought-of issues. We recommend including some similar sessions in our ongoing lookout panel activities. OPP participants in the discussion expressed a desire for some kind of follow-up to issues that were raised so that the deliberations would lead to some specific products. In response to this and in keeping with our mission to report environmental problems that may arise or increase in the future and their potential solution, we agreed to highlight a few issues in our report as deserving of special attention on the part of the Agency. The two issues, chosen by the OPP participants after the meeting, are: 1. Scenarios for the evaluation of ecological risk. This is a need which has already become apparent and is likely to grow. Relatively little is being done in this area, since the Food Quality Protection Act focuses mainly on issues associated with human health risk from direct exposure to pesticides. 2. Mechanisms and structures across Agencies to allow sharing of information. These are necessary to some extent to carry out the requirements of the Food Quality Protection Act. They are likely to become much more essential in the future as the need to do holistic assessments increases. Sincerely, /signed/ Dr. Genevieve Matanoski, Chair Lookout Panel Science Advisory Board ------- U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY SCIENCE ADVISORY BOARD EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE CHAIR Dr. Genevieve M. Matanoski, School of Hygiene and Public Health, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD MEMBERS Dr. Richard Bull, Battelle Pacific Northwest Laboratories, Molecular Biosciences, Richland, WA Dr. Maureen Cropper, The World Bank, Washington, DC Dr. Joan M. Daisey, Indoor Environment Program, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, Berkeley, CA Dr. William Glaze, Department of Environmental Science and Engineering, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC Dr. Mark Harwell, Rosentiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, University of Miami, Miami, FL Dr. Morton Lippmann, Nelson Institute of Environmental Medicine, New York University, Tuxedo, NY Dr. Alan Maki, EXXON Company, USA, Houston, TX Dr. Joe Mauderly, Lovelace Respiratory Reseach Institute, Albuquerque, NM Dr. Granger M. Morgan, Department of Engineering & Public Policy, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA Dr. Ishwar P. Murarka, Land & Groundwater Protection and Remediation, Electric Power Research Institute, Palo Alto, CA Dr. Emil Pfitzer, Research Institute for Fragrance Materials, Hackensack, NJ ------- Dr. Paul Portney, Resources for the Future, Washington, DC Dr. Jerry P. Schubel, New England Aquarium, Boston, MA Dr. William Randall Seeker, Energy and Environmental Research Corp., Irvine, CA Dr. Ellen K. Silbergeld, Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, University of Maryland, Baltimore, MD Dr. James E. Watson, Jr., Department of Environmental Sciences and Engineering, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC LIAISON FOR SCIENCE ADVISORY PANEL Dr. Ernest McConnell, National Toxicology Program (Retired), Raleigh, NC SCIENCE ADVISORY BOARD STAFF Dr. Donald G. Barnes, Staff Director and Designated Federal Official, Science Advisory Board (1400), US Environmental Protection Agency, 401 M Street, SW, Washington, DC 20460 Ms. Priscilla Y. Tillery, Staff Secretary, Science Advisory Board (1400), US Environmental Protection Agency, 401 M Street, SW, Washington, DC 20460 ------- NOTICE This report has been written as part of the activities of the Science Advisory Board, a public advisory group providing extramural scientific information and advice to the Administrator and other officials of the Environmental Protection Agency. The Board is structured to provide balanced, expert assessment of scientific matters related to problems facing the Agency. This report has not been reviewed for approval by the Agency and, hence, the contents of this report do not necessarily represent the views and policies of the Environmental Protection Agency, nor of other agencies in the Executive Branch of the Federal government, nor does mention of trade names or commercial products constitute a recommendation for use. ------- DISTRIBUTION The Administrator Deputy Administrator AA Office of Water Assistant Administrators Regional Administrators EPA Headquarters Library EPA Regional Libraries Chair, FIFRA Scientific Advisory Panel Chair, ORD Board of Scientific Counselors Library of Congress National Technical Information Service Congressional Research Service ------- |