&EPA
United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
Office of Water
4304T
EPA-822-F-02-001
November 2002
                   Fact Sheet
   Revision of National Recommended Water Quality Criteria: 2002	

   Summary
   EPA has revised its national recommended water quality criteria for 83 chemical criteria to
   protect human health.  These updated criteria supercede any published in EPA's previous
   criteria compilations including the "Blue Book," "Red Book," "Gold Book" and EPA's last
   compilation published in April 1999.
   Background
   The Clean Water Act (CWA) requires EPA to
   publish and periodically update ambient
   water quality criteria. These criteria are
   intended to ". . .  accurately reflect the latest
   scientific knowledge ... on the kind and
   extent of all identifiable effects on health and
   welfare including, but not limited  to, plankton,
   fish, shellfish, wildlife, plant life .  . . which may
   be expected from the presence of pollutants
   in any body of water. . ."

   Water quality criteria developed under
   section 304(a) of the Clean Water Act are
   based solely on data and scientific judgments
   on the relationship between pollutant
   concentrations and environmental and
   human health effects.  EPA's national
   recommended water quality criteria are
   guidance for states and tribes in  adopting
   water quality standards under section 303(c)
   of the CWA.  These water quality criteria are
   not regulations and do not impose legally
   binding requirements on EPA, states,
   authorized tribes or the public.

   The revised national recommended water
   quality criteria may, however, be superceded
   by the publication of 304(a) criteria after the
   publication of this update.

   What's new in the updated
   compilation?
   The 83 revised human health criteria  have
   been recalculated based on EPA's  new
   methodology entitled, Methodology for
   Deriving Ambient Water Quality Criteria for
   the Protection of Human Health (2000) (EPA-
   822-B-00-004). This is a partial update
   based on a comprehensive revision of
   components of the 304(a) criteria. Partial
                               updates represent a way of increasing the
                               frequency of scientific improvements to the
                               nationally recommended criteria. The revised
                               human health criteria specifically integrate
                               the new fish consumption rate of 17.5
                               grams/day, relative source contribution (RSC)
                               factors obtained from primary drinking water
                               standards, and  any new cancer potency
                               factors (q1*s) or reference doses (RfDs) in
                               the Agency's Integrated Risk Information
                               System (IRIS).

                               The criteria do not incorporate bioaccumu-
                               lation factors (BAFs), a component of the
                               new methodology. Rather, the criteria rely on
                               bioconcentration factors (BCFs). EPA
                               intends to focus resources on developing
                               BAFs for pollutants that the Agency considers
                               of high priority and national importance, due
                               to the comparative complexity of developing
                               this component. The revised human health
                               criteria are more stringent than those
                               previously published, however, they are
                               consistent with  the criteria updates in the
                               recently published compilation.
                               EPA is separately publishing partial updates
                               for 15 criteria in the Federal  Register
                               because the revisions significantly change
                               the numerical values. EPA will accept
                               scientific views  on these 15 criteria. This is
                               consistent with  the process for publishing
                               criteria previously described in the April 1999
                               compilation.

                               Additional Information
                               EPA's updated  national recommended water
                               quality criteria compilation, including the 83
                               revisions, is available in a report, National
                               Recommended Water Quality Criteria: 2002
                               (EPA-822-R-02-047). You can find it on the

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Internet at
http://epa.gov/waterscience/criteria/wqcriteria.html

For additional information about EPA's
compilation of national recommended water
quality criteria, contact:
Cindy Roberts
Health and Ecological Criteria Div. (4304T)
1200 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W.
Washington, D.C.  20460
       (202)566-1124
       Roberts.Cindy@epa.gov

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