Abstract
Soil with high levels of polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and polychlorinated dibenzofurans (PCDD/Fs) is found at contaminated sites all over the world. Transfer of PCDD/Fs from contaminated soil to the food chain could lead to elevated human exposure. As a complement to available monitoring data, multimedia fate and exposure modeling can be applied to support risk assessment of sites with PCDD/F contaminated soil. In this study, we evaluated the performance of the CalTOX fate and exposure model for 2,3,7,8-substituted PCDD/Fs against measured concentrations in air, soil, grass, carrots, potatoes, milk, meat, and eggs from a contaminated site in northern Sweden. The calculated total toxic equivalent (TEQ) concentrations agree with measurements within a factor of 10 for all exposure media but one. Results for individual congeners demonstrated that the model did not always perform well at describing key processes that mobilize PCDD/Fs out of soils, such as transfer into root crops and ingestion of soil by chickens. Uncertainty in only a small subset of input parameters affects the model output. Improved information and models describing transfer of soil particles onto leafy vegetation by rain splash and biotransfer factors for PCDD/Fs to milk, meat, and eggs are particular research needs to reduce uncertainties in model-based assessments.
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This work financed by the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency (contract numbers E-92-05 and E-5-06) and the Swedish Research Council Formas (contract number 242-2009-781).
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Åberg, A., MacLeod, M. & Wiberg, K. Performance of the CalTOX fate and exposure model in a case study for a dioxin-contaminated site. Environ Sci Pollut Res 22, 8719–8727 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-014-4037-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-014-4037-7