Distributions Selected for Use in Probabilistic Human Health Risk Assessments in Oregon
Title:
Distributions Selected for Use in Probabilistic Human Health Risk Assessments in Oregon
Author:
Hope, Bruce K.
Appeared in:
Human and ecological risk assessment
Paging:
Volume 5 (1999) nr. 4 pages 785-808
Year:
1999-08-01
Contents:
In 1995, Oregon enacted amendments to its state Cleanup Law that emphasize risk-based remedial action decisions and allow a responsible party to conduct probabilistic human health risk assessments. This change required selection and/or development of probability density functions for exposure factors frequently used in human health risk assessments. Methods used to obtain distributions for body weight, soil, water, vegetable/fruit, fish, and animal product ingestion, soil adherence, daily inhalation rate, various event and exposure frequencies, and exposure duration are described. Primary data sources were U.S. Environmental Protection Agency guidance and peer-reviewed scientific literature. These distributions of exposure factors may be used, in conjunction with a probabilistic age- and gender-based model, to calculate prospective exposures and risks. A brief overview of this model, which handles temporal parameters (age, exposure frequency, exposure duration) in a manner substantially different from that typically used in deterministic assessments, is also provided. Oregon's development of an age/ gender-based exposure model, and its selection of exposure factor value distributions for that model, represents one of the first attempts to develop practical approaches to using probabilistic techniques in a hazardous waste regulatory program.
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