Making environmental risk assessment systems-based
SYBERAC's first newsletter
SYBERAC stands for "Towards a SYstems-Based, holistic Environmental Risk Assessment of Chemicals". The project, funded by Horizon Europe, started in January 2024 and will run for four years. It focuses on developing a systems-based Environmental Risk Assessment (sb-ERA) in 6 work packages. The project coordinator Nico van den Brink (Wageningen University & Research) comments on the goals of the project:
“Biodiversity and ecosystem services are societal essentials! SYBERAC is focused on sustaining biodiversity by moving risk assessment of chemicals toward a needed, systems-based approach. I am very excited to work with the European scientific leaders in SYBERAC, and even more so to engage stakeholders from local and regional level to EU-level. With SYBERAC, we provide scientific support for the EU’s zero pollution ambition, one of the commitments of the EU Green Deal.”
SYBERAC had its face-to-face kick-off meeting. To get to know each other and lay out our cooperation, our coordinating partner’s from Wageningen University & Research hosted us in February 2024. We are happy to move environmental risk assessment (ERA) towards a systems-based approach.
Find out more about the institutions and individuals involved in SYBERAC on our website!
Follow us on social media to stay up-to-date about SYBERAC and environmental risk assessment on a weekly basis and stay up-to-date with our publications on Zenodo.
A survey is being conducted to enhance the environmental risk assessment (ERA) of chemicals. This initiative is part of a collaborative effort involving three key projects: PARC, PollinERA, and SYBERAC. Together, we aim to advance ERA methodologies to meet the European Commission’s Green Deal policy targets.
As an initial step, the survey mainly targets regulatory Risk Assessors working with ERA for plant protection products under Regulation (EC) No 1107/2009. In future rounds, regulatory needs may also be collected from a broader range of stakeholders, such as risk managers, farmers associations and academic scientists.
The insights gathered from this survey will deepen our understanding of current ERA methodologies for plant protection products, supporting the transition towards integrative and systems-based approaches. The anonymized results will be presented in a future online workshop (see next section).
SYBERAC Webinar: Collaboration Opportunities for Environmental Risk Assessment (WP1)
We are hosting an online open event to introduce collaboration opportunities and disseminate initial results from the survey, where participants will have the opportunity to comment, ask questions and express interest in contributing to the ongoing work.
It will take place on 11 September 2024, the exact time is to be determined.
The SYBERAC project’s work package 2 (WP2), led by the University of Castilla-La Mancha (UCLM), will conduct case studies to advance the understanding of chemical risks in real settings. The key Objectives of WP2 are the following:
Exposure Routes and Environmental Fate: Identify how chemicals move and interact within terrestrial biodiversity networks under various exposure scenarios.
Effects on Key Species: Determine impacts of pollutants on key species, identifying critical endpoints for individual-level assessment.
Landscape-Based Evaluation: Integrate findings into a landscape-based evaluation, using ecosystem service units to support systems-based Environmental Risk Assessments (ERA).
Stakeholder Engagement: Provide actionable insights and proofs-of-concept to stakeholders, with effective dissemination plans.
WP2's success relies on collaboration across countries and disciplines, building a foundation to mitigate chemical risks to biodiversity and ecosystems. There are 6 case studies in 5 of the 7 participating countries, involving 10 out of 12 project partners.
All case study topics, some of which have two study sites:
CS1 – Cumulative exposure of wildlife to PPP in an agricultural system (winter cereals) (Spain, United Kingdom)
CS2 – Pollutant transfer and effects in the interface between aquatic and terrestrial environments (Spain)
CS3 – Food chain exposure and related effects across spatial scales in a migratory bird (Pan-Europe from Netherlands to Spain)
CS4 – Fate and risk management of multiple chemicals of emerging concern (Sweden & Spain)
CS5 – Plant protection product (PPP) effects on soil biodiversity and on ecosystem function of soil invertebrate community (Portugal)
CS6 – Pressure of pollutants transported from emission sources into nature protected areas (Netherlands)
We look forward to sharing more findings in future updates. Learn more soon when our individual Case Study pages launch!
WP3 started with organising exchanges/discussions between the case study coordinators and the scientists responsible for modelling (modellers) on how modelling can support SYBERAC’s case studies and the issues that are addressed. Important questions:
What are the focal substances, and do we have sufficient information on the environmental conditions relevant for solute transport and the fate of these substances in the environment?
What are the focal species and potential exposure routes?
Soon we aim to further develop conceptual models and provide instructions to the case study coordinators on which parameters should be measured and what should be the (ideal) spatial distribution and frequency of these measurements.
Upcoming events
Bold = SYBERAC partners present
EUROTOX 2024 | Copenhagen, Denmark | 8–11 September 2024
