The OECD Environmental Risk Assessment Toolkit describes the work flow for environmental risk assessment and management of chemicals with links to available OECD material relevant for the different steps in risk assessment and management. This new version of the Toolkit is more interactive and has added functionalities. It will be populated with additional tools and case studies in the future.

This document presents the outcomes of the 3rd OECD Biopesticide Seminar, held in 2011, that focused on the topic of “botanicals” (also known as plant extracts). The Seminar reviewed a number of scientific and regulatory issues related to the “characterisation and analyses of botanicals for the use in plant protection products”.

US Environmental Protection Agency derived the Human health benchmarks for pesticides by applying the health effects data from pesticide registrations to the typical methods used for developing drinking water health advisories. It was developed to enable states, water systems and the public to better determine whether the detection of a pesticide in drinking water or source waters for drinking water may indicate a potential health risk.

This revised document supplies basic information (compositional considerations, key constituents), useful in risk/safety assessment of food and feed using new varieties of soybean (Glycine max.). This updated publication replaces the original issue of 2001.

This is a guidance on sample preparation and dosimetry, to which special attention should be paid when testing nanomaterials for human health and environmental safety endpoints.

This is the report of the workshop on Natural-hazard triggered technological accidents (Natech) that took place 23-25 May 2012. It investigated the specific elements of the prevention of, preparedness for, and response to chemical accidents caused by natural hazard or natural disaster.

This document provides information on current/planned activities related to the safety of manufactured nanomaterials in OECD member and non-member countries that attended at the 10th meeting of OECD’s Working Party on Manufactured Nanomaterials (Paris France, 27-29 June 2012).

This document compares sectors of industrial activities and their reporting thresholds among different national / regional PRTRs to improve the comparability of PRTR data, and proposes a harmonised list of sectors.

Malaysia has joined the OECD system for the Mutual Acceptance of Data (MAD) in the Assessment of Chemicals, ensuring that its non-clinical safety data related to the protection of human health and the environment will be accepted by all 40 countries adhering to MAD.

This document provides guidance for performing an exposure assessment based on environmental monitoring data.It covers topics such as environmental levels and distribution of contaminants, ways of using monitoring data in exposure assessments for differing purposes, the collection of data, quality of monitoring activities, as well as several examples of data compilation in member countries and their use in exposure assessment.

This is an analysis of a 2010 survey regarding carbon capture and long-term storage (CCS). It provides information that helps understand the hazards of CO2 sequestration and the risks to human health and environmental safety. It also identifies accident scenarios, including those associated with CO2 capture and compression, storage prior to transport and injection for geological storage.

The Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) database of completed chemical reviews including (in some cases) detailed risk assessment reports addressing human health and the environment. A review, initiated from new concerns, may lead to the reconsideration of the registration of agricultural and veterinary chemicals in the marketplace if potential risks to safety and performance have been identified.

This document follows on from a report entitled Important Issues on Risk Assessment of Manufactured Nanomaterials [ENV/JM/MONO(2012)8]. This report identified a range of issues which the WPMN considered important in risk assessment and which should be addressed in the future. It summarised results of a survey which was circulated to delegations of the WPMN, methodologies used to analyze the survey, and the identified priorities.

The Gefahrstoffdatenbank der Länder, a german database, is now linked to eChemPortal. 102545 substance records can be searched through the substance search. This includes German hazardous substances legislation as well as other sources reflecting the state of technology and occupational health and safety relating to activities involving hazardous substances. In addition, it contains links to various other German data bases.

This Biosafety document aims to serve as an aid to risk assessors and regulators; providing guidance on handling the aspects of an environmental safety assessment, accessing and using information in situations of low-level presence (LLP) of transgenic plants in seed and grain commodities.

The OECD has recommended its Member Countries apply existing international and national chemical regulatory frameworks to manage the risks associated with manufactured nanomaterials.

The OECD is to review its chemical hazard assessment programme with the aim of providing a more specialised service for member countries from 2015.

This document supplies basic information useful in the risk and safety assessment of food and feed using new varieties of oyster mushroom: compositional considerations, key constituents (nutrients, anti-nutrients and toxicants). It is issued in the Novel Food and Feed Safety Series.

eChemPortal uses are encouraged to respond to the on-line survey. Your use of the portal, your expectations, information, substance search, property search, structure search, design and layout. Your answers will help us improve eChemPortal - the Global Portal to Information on Chemical Substances, worldwide source of information about chemicals from authorities and international organisations, to meet your needs.

This document includes the conclusions and recommendations resulting from a workshop that addressed the ecotoxicology and environmental fate of manufactured nanomaterials, and in particular the applicability of existing OECD Test Guidelines (TG) related to these topics. A number of TG developments are underway at OECD as a follow-up to these recommendations.

This document provides information on the sources, use patterns, and potential release pathways of chemicals used in the manufacture of thermal and carbonless copy paper. It presents approaches for estimating the environmental releases of and occupational exposures to additives and components used in thermal and carbonless copy paper coatings.

The OECD has published a guidance for characterising oleochemical substances. The method presented gives guidance on how these complex substances can be characterised in a way that their composition is accurately and consistently reflected to ensure that substances with the same chemical composition, manufactured in different countries, can be characterised with the same description for hazard assessment purposes.

The OECD has published the second edition of the guidance on grouping of chemicals. This edition has been augmented with experience and examples encountered in the OECD Cooperative Chemicals Assessment Programme. It also introduces new or revised guidance on elaborating the analogue and category approach, quantitative and qualitative read-across, justifying read-across, and using bioprofiling results for grouping chemicals.

A report of the 2013 joint OECD/Swedish Chemicals Agency/European Commission workshop on the assessment and management of risks of microbial pesticides that resulted in 20 recommendations for approaches that could be taken now and areas for follow-up work to be undertaken by OECD or Member countries.

The webinar will specifically be looking at recent developments in alternatives to long chain PFCs. Per- and polyfluorinated chemicals (PFCs) have been in use since the 1950s as ingredients or intermediates of surfactants and surface protectors for assorted industrial and consumer applications.

This document compiles information on the current methodologies, tools and models and helps readers identify appropriate models/ and methodologies for estimating substance-specific removal/emissions from wastewater treatment systems. It could support efforts to improve these models and tools.

The first version of the Globally Harmonised Submission and Transport Standard was published May 2014. The GHSTS is a standardised set of technical specifications used to assemble electronic files for any pesticide package in a predefined manner. Once the files are assembled according to the specifications, they can be transferred from a business entity to a regulatory authority and can be extracted for use in a regulatory process.

This OECD monograph demonstrates how a chemical hazard assessment that considers and ranks all available relevant information - a so-called weight of evidence approach - can be constructed to conclude on a particular hazard endpoint for a chemical, in this case, skin sensitisation for 4-isopropylaniline.

This report includes the conclusions and recommendation of an expert workshop on Physical-Chemical Properties of Manufactured Nanomaterials and Test Guidelines organized by OECD’s Working Party on Manufactured Nanomaterials. The workshop addressed issues relevant to the physical-chemical properties of manufactured nanomaterials from a regulatory perspective point with a view to the need for new or adapted test guidelines.

This scoping document brings forward relevant in vitro and ex vivo thyroid assays to the attention of OECD member countries, and provide recommendations for their further development/use, and also, to identify aspects of the thyroid signalling pathway that are not covered and would require further attention

This report of a survey collates member countries’ approaches to manage and mitigate the risk of pesticide use near residential areas.

The Joint Substance Data Pool of the German Federal Government and Federal States (GSBL) is now linked to eChemPortal. Records contain information on physical and chemical properties, on ecotoxicological and toxicological parameters and on environmental fate. They provide descriptions of environmental hazards, health dangers, fire and other technical hazards and give information on relevant chemicals-related legislation.

This publication is a tool for environmental safety assessment of EUCALYPTUS novel lines. Planted in the tropics and sub-tropics, E. species can be genetically-engineered for resistance to disease/drought/cold/salinity, or lower lignin content. Elements useful to biosafety evaluation are detailed, e.g. Eucalyptus taxonomy, origin, reproduction, genetics, hybridisation, ecology, allergens-toxins, beneficial chemical products, breeding.

This document presents the results of the workshop on children’s exposure to chemicals on 7-8 October 2013 in Utrecht, the Netherlands. The main outcomes are 1) a decision tree to enable risk assessors to decide when they should perform children specific exposure and risk assessment, and 2) recommendations for further work on specific exposure assessment issues.

On 26 September 2014, the OECD Council adopted three new, five updated and one corrected OECD Test Guidelines for the testing of chemicals.

The OECD has published a report on a pilot chemical classification exercise undertaken in 2013 and ‘14. Using a number of chemical assessments agreed in the OECD hazard assessment programme, reasons why classification proposals may differ were investigated. The report concludes on the main reasons for such differences, and recommends some measures to overcome some of them.

The OECD Advisory Group on Endocrine Disrupters Testing and Assessment met on 16-17 October 2014 in Paris to discuss the development and update of Test Guidelines and related documents for endocrine disrupters testing and assessment.

PRTR have been established throughout the world to track releases and transfers of potentially harmful chemicals. But most of the PRTR systems were designed without considering comparability, each PRTR has its own requirement of reporting chemicals and sectors. To harmonise globally, OECD reviewed the reporting chemicals and sectors across PRTR systems and produced proposal for harmonised lists of reporting pollutants.

An addendum to the OECD Guiding Principles on Chemical Accident Prevention, Preparedness and Response to address Natural Hazards Triggering Technological Accidents (Natech) Risk Management has just been published. The addendum consists of a number of amendments to the Guiding Principles and the addition of a new Chapter to provide more detailed guidance on Natech prevention, preparedness and response.

Micro-organisms play a fundamental role in the environment. Yet their role is the result of complex biogeochemical processes by consortia of micro-organisms and the function of individual species is not clear in many cases. This publication provides an overview of the current situation and relevant developments in environmental microbiology.

This toolbox is a compilation of resources relevant to chemical substitution and alternatives assessments. Alternative assessments are processes for identifying, comparing and selecting safer alternatives to replace hazardous chemicals with the objective of promoting sustainable production and consumption.

The OECD has published guidance to facilitate the ecological risk assessment of organometallic and organic metal salt substances. A strategy is presented based on key steps that first consider the fate of these substances in the environment, the identification of moieties of concern, and subsequently the selection of an appropriate path forward to either assess the inorganic moiety and/or the individual substance.

In 2011, Brazil joined OECD’s Mutual Acceptance of Data (MAD) system ensuring that its chemical safety test data will be accepted by all 40 countries adhering to MAD. Originally limited to data developed in Brazil on pesticides, biocides and industrial chemicals, it now also includes veterinary products, feed additives, cosmetics, pharmaceutical products, sanitizers, wood preservative and treatments of effluents and natural ecosystems.

The new version of the IOMC Toolbox for Decision Making in Chemicals Management provides a set of interactive features allowing governments to use it as a platform for collaboration among ministries, agencies, and other stakeholders such as industry. Users can save their information, add comments, and share and discuss issues with colleagues and partners.

Today the OECD marks the end of a seven year experimental testing programme, investigating 11 commercially viable nanomaterials across 110 chemical tests. The results were co-ordinated across 11 countries with tests and data generated from government agencies, universities, research institutions and businesses. Over 780 studies on the specific properties of nanomaterials were undertaken.

The OECD eChemPortal, a web portal which offers comprehensive information on chemical substances, has been updated to offer better access to chemical classifications according to the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS).

The OECD/UNEP Global PFC group has published two new reports to support efforts in the framework of the Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (SAICM) to improve information sharing at a global level on perfluorinated chemistries.

This document provides background information on activities related to manufactured nanomaterials, as well as other activities on nanotechnologies at the international level. The information provided in this document captures OECD activities between February and December 2013.

The OECD has published fundamental and guiding principles to facilitate the application of QSAR methods to the risk assessment of chemicals. The main focus is on the critical role of mechanistic consideration in improving various (Q)SAR approaches and possible integrative approaches of combining chemoinformatics and bioinformatics.

This new document focuses on the evaluation of test methods applied to determine the physico-chemical properties of different types of nanomaterials.