Comparison of AB2588 multipathway risk factors for California fossil-fuel power stations
Conference
·
OSTI ID:353544
- IWG Corp., San Diego, CA (United States)
- Electric Power Research Inst., Palo Alto, CA (United States)
Substances released from power plants may travel through various exposure pathways resulting in human health and environmental risks. The stack air emission`s primary pathway is inhalation from the ambient air. Multipathway factors (adjustment factors to the inhalation risk) are used to evaluate the importance of non-inhalation pathways (such as ingestion and dermal contact). The multipathway factor for a specific substance is the health risk by all pathways divided by the inhalation health risk for that substance. These factors are compared for fossil fuel power stations that submitted regulatory risk assessments in compliance with California Toxic Hot Spots Act (AB2588). Substances representing the largest contributions to the cancer risk are of primary concern: arsenic, beryllium, cadmium, chromium (+6), formaldehyde, nickel, lead, selenium, and PAHs. Comparisons of the chemical-specific multipathway factors show the impacts of regulatory policy decisions on the estimated health risk for trace substances. As an example, point estimates of the soil mixing depth, varying from 1 cm to 15 cm, relate to the relative importance of the pathway. For the deeper mixing depths, the root-zone uptake by homegrown tomato plants (for assumed consumption rate of 15% for San Diego) may result in high multipathway factors for several trace metals. For shallower mixing depths, soil ingestion may become the dominant non-inhalation pathway. These differences may lead to significantly different risk estimates for similar facilities located at different California locations such as to be under local regulatory authorities. The overall multipathway factor for the total cancer risk is about 2, much smaller than some of the chemical-specific factors. Science-based multipathway analysis should reduce much of the concern that may be due to policy-based decisions on pathway selection and high-value point-estimates of the parameters.
- OSTI ID:
- 353544
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-970677--
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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