Romanian aquatic toxicity testing strategy under REACH

Abstract

Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006 – Registration, Evaluation and Authorization of Chemicals (REACH) is the most important European legislative regulation concerning chemicals and became applicable in Romania since June 2008. In the period 2008–2011, chemicals manufactures/importers and also eco-toxicological laboratories have made great efforts to comply with these requirements. The paper presents our contribution, as laboratory testing, to evaluate the aquatic toxicity of hazard substances and to provide information about environmental risks. Concerning REACH challenges, our laboratory has developed a toxicity testing methodology based on tests involving animals, but at the same time to provide the necessary data for the eco-toxicological characterization of chemicals. As other countries, Romania has chemical pollution problems and in this context we performed a various aquatic toxicity studies for different substances, using an integrated eco-toxicological strategy, in an interdisciplinary collaboration. A reduced number of acute toxicity tests using fish were performed in our laboratory, but to obtain data it was necessary to evaluate the effects of the chemicals on the aquatic organisms, the LC50 bio assays were replaced with algae and crustacean EC50 tests. The fish bio assays were applied for fewer concentrations, the smallest between the EC50 obtained for algae and crustacean and only if the fish were more sensitive than algae and crustacean, acute fish tests were performed for lower concentrations. Our results led to predict the maximum allowable concentrations (MATC) in surface water and non observed effect concentration (NOEC) and also, to estimate the environmental risk coefficients. Our vision and assessment strategy are in continuous development in order to respond to future demands concerning toxicity on long-term, toxicity pathways, bio accumulation, recalcitrant metabolites toxicity and inter-species effects extrapolations.