EPA-820-N-08-001 SEPA Summer 2018 United States Environmental Protection Agency A FS1 1/ i\§ Newsletter FEDERAL-STATE TOXICOLOGY RISK ANALYSIS COMMITTEE What Is FSTRAC? FSTRAC's purpose is to build a better relationship with states and tribes to exchange research pri- orities and results, policy concerns regarding water-related human health risk assessment, and technical information. FSTRAC is made up of representatives from state and tribal health and environ- mental agencies and EPA Headquarters and Regional personnel. FSTRAC is an integral part of EPA's communication strategy with states and tribes. FSTRAC fosters cooperation, consistency, and an under- standing of EPA's and different states' and tribe's goals and problems in human health risk assessment. It allows states, tribes and the federal government to work together on issues related to the development and implementation of regulations and criteria under the Safe Drinking Water Act and Clean Water Act. Information on FSTRAC can be found on the EPA web page (https://www.epa.gov/water-research/ federal-state-toxicology-risk-analysis-committee-fstrac) Recent Webinars FSTRAC holds several webinars each year to share information through presentations and discussions regarding human health risk analysis and water quality issues. February 2018 FSTRAC Webinar EPA held a FSTRAC Webinar in February 2018 during which the following topics were discussed: Health Advisory Table Revisions (presented by Ms. Sophie Greene and Dr. Brittany Jacobs, EPA/OW): Ms. Greene and Dr. Jacobs presented an overview of EPA's 2018 Drinking Water Standards and Health Advisory (HA) table revisions including background information, changes included in the 2018 revision, and EPA's plan to modernize the HA tables in the future. They requested input from users of the HA tables to inform the modernization effort. If you are interested in par- ticipating in this effort, please email Dr. Shamima Akhter (akhter.shamima@epa.gov). The purpose of this newsletter is to keep Federal-State Toxicology and Risk Analysis Committee (FSTRAC) members up-to-date on current developments in toxicology, risk analysis, and water quality criteria and standards. This newsletter also provides information on recent FSTRAC webinars and upcoming events. Please share this newsletter with anyone you think might be interested in these topics. If you are interested in joining FSTRAC, please contact the FSTRAC Chair, Dr. Shamima Akhter (Akhter.Shamima@epa.gov). Haloacetic Acids - Health Effects, Occurrence, and What We Anticipate Learning from the Fourth Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule (UCMR 4) (presented by Mr. Stig Regli, EPA/OW): Mr. Stig Regli provided an overview of haloacetic acid (HA A) health effects, occurrence, and what EPA anticipates learning from UCMR 4. He described the assessment of carcino- genicity evidence for the thirteen HAAs reviewed by the National Toxicology Program. Mr. Regli also described HAA occurrence from the Disinfection Byproduct Information Collection Rule (DBP ICR) and 6 Year Review 3 and HAA UCMR 4 monitoring requirements. He provided information on what EPA anticipates learning from UCMR 4, including the national occurrence of HAAs by system type and size and how HAAs vary by source water total organic carbon, bromide concentrations and treatment characteristics. ------- 2 EPA's RapidTox Tool, Including the Updated Chemical Dashboard (presented by Dr. Richard Judson, EPA/ORD): Dr. Richard Judson provided background informa- tion on EPA's National Center for Computational Toxicology and on RapidTox. He mentioned that the overall goal of RapidTox was to provide tools to allow risk assessors to perform first-order (rapid, screen- ing-level) risk assessments on one or many chemicals relatively rapidly. Dr. Judson provided examples of how RapidTox was used as a prioritization tool. He also provided an overview of the RapidTox dashboard and how it can be used to access high-tier data and to fill data gaps. Risk Assessment Drinking Water Minnesota Department of Health The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) has completed water guidance for N-nitrosodimethylamine, boron, and perfluorobutane sulfonate (PFBS) in recent months. Chemicals cur- rently under full toxicology review by MDH include: Benzo(a)pyrene, bromodichloromethane, and three trimethylbenzenes. MDH's program to re-evaluate existing water guidance values has recently completed reviews of acetone, dichlorodifluoromethane, ethylene glycol, and manganese. More detailed information on MDH water guidance values can be found on MDH's Human Health-Based Water Guidance Table web- site at: http://www.health.state.mn.us/divs/eh/risk/ guidance/gw/table.html. Clean Water EPA's Five-year Review of the 2012 Recreational Water Quality Criteria EPA has released its Five-year Review of the 2012 Recreational Water Quality Criteria (RWQC), as required by the BEACH Act amendments to the Clean Water Act. The review describes the state of the science related to human health protection in water bodies designated for primary contact recreation, such as swimming, since the EPA published the 2012 RWQC. The review report also contains technical assessments which form the basis for the EPA's deci- sion not to revise the 2012 Recreational Water Criteria during this review cycle. The Agency believes, how- ever, that further research and analysis as identified in this Report will contribute to future EPA review of the 2012 RWQC. The EPA will work with the environ- mental public health community as it moves forward with its research efforts. The use of qPCR and ongo- ing research in methods and indicators continue to strengthen and augment the tools available to support the current criteria. View the report: https://www.epa.gov/wqc/five-year- review-2012-recreational-water-quality-criteria EPA's 2013 and 2015 Biennial Reviews of the Federal Biosolids (Sewage Sludge) Standards EPA has published the 2013 and 2015 biennial reviews of the federal biosolids (sewage sludge) standards. The Clean Water Act requires EPA to review federal biosolids (sewage sludge) standards every two years to identify additional toxic pollutants that occur in biosolids and set regulations for those pollutants if sufficient scientific evidence shows they may harm human health or the environment. Based on the results of the reviews, EPA has not identified addi- tional toxic pollutants in biosolids for regulation. View the biennial biosolids reviews on EPA's website: https://www.epa.gov/biosolids/biennial-reviews- sewage-sludge-standards. If you have any questions, please contact Liz Resek (resek.elizabeth@epa.gov or 202-566-1228). Minnesota Department of Health MDH enthusiastically partners with local govern- ments and organizations to increase public awareness about Contaminants of Emerging Concern (CECs) in drinking water, with support from Minnesota's Clean Water Fund. One formal mechanism of this partner- ship is to solicit proposals and award outreach and education grants to groups outside state government. These projects are designed to highlight good prac- tices regarding keeping CECs out of the environment, FSTRAC Newsletter ~ Summer 2018 ------- 3 septic system use and CECs, and on how to best perform CEC outreach at the watershed level. More information can be found at: http://www.health.state, mn.us/divs/eh/risk/guidance/dwec/outreachproj.html A new report, "Advancing Safe and Sustainable Water Reuse in Minnesota," is now available along with information on water reuse system sampling results. Links to these documents are included here: http://www.health.state.mn.us/divs/eh/water/dwp_ cwl/reuse/2018report.pdf http://www.health.state.mn.us/divs/eh/risk/guidance/ dwec/qmr a/umresults .pdf. Since 2015 when directed by the state legislature, MDH has been engaged in a comprehensive effort with many partners to study and make recommenda- tions for regulatory and non-regulatory approaches to water reuse at the state level. The 2018 report rep- resents a major step in this effort. At SETAC 2017 in Minneapolis, MDH chaired sessions dealing with pharmaceuticals in the environment including MDH's work on pharmaceu- tical screening values, screening and prioritization methods and techniques. MDH also presented on per- fluorinated chemicals in Minnesota, including both the history and ongoing current events in Minnesota. Most presentations were recorded from these sessions and are available on SETAC's website, which can be found here: http://setac.sclivelearningcenter.com/ index.aspx?PID=9483. Publications Pertinent to Drinking Water Issues Goeden H. 2018. Focus on Chronic Exposure for Deriving Drinking Water Guidance Underestimates Potential Risk to Infants. Int J Environ Res Public Health 15(3)512; doi:10.3390/ijerphl5030512. Upcoming Events and Conferences Upcoming FSTRAC Webinar The next FSTRAC Webinar is tentatively scheduled for September/October 2018. Additional details, including the date of the next FSTRAC Webinar, will be pro- vided to FSTRAC members in the coming weeks. SETAC North America Annual Meeting SETAC will be holding its 39th annual North America meeting on November 4-8, 2018, in Sacramento, California. Additional information is provided on the SETAC website: https://sacramento.setac.org/ SRA 2018 Annual Meeting - Society for Risk Analysis SRA will be holding its annual meeting on December 2-6, 2018, in New Orleans, Louisiana. Additional information is available on the SRA website: http://srameetings.wpengine.com/ NAS Systematic Review Workshop: Mechanistic Data to Support Chemical Assessment The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine will be holding a workshop on December 10-11, 2018, in Washington, DC, on current state-of-the-art in performing sys- tematic reviews of mechanistic data to support chemical assessments. Additional information is available on the Systematic Review Workshop Eventbrite page: https://www.eventbrite.eom/e/ systematic-review-workshop-mechanistic-data-to- support-chemical-assessments-tickets-49211252180 SOT Annual Meeting SOT will be holding its 58th annual meeting on March 10-14, 2019, in Baltimore, Maryland. Additional information about the March 2019 meet- ing is provided on the SOT website: https://www. toxicology.org/events/am/AM 2019/prepar ing_ proposals.asp FSTRAC Newsletter ~ Summer 2018 ------- ASM Microbe 2019 - American Society for Microbiology ASM will be holding its annual meeting on June 20-24, 2019, in the Moscone Center in San Francisco, California. Additional information is available on the ASM website: https://www.asm.org/index.php/ asm-microbe-2018/future-meeting- dates EPA IRIS Upcoming Events EPA IRIS holds public meetings and workshops on issues in risk assessment. Additional information is provided on the EPA IRIS public meetings and workshop website: https://cfpub.epa.gov/ncea/iris2/ events.cfm FSTRAC Newsletter ~ Summer 2018 ------- |