EPA Gears Up for Review of Particulate Standard
EPA has published its first draft Integrated Science Assessment (ISA) for public review and comment. The ISA is available online.
The annexes which will include detailed tables summarizing new studies will be published online on January 9, 2009. Written comments will be accepted until March 13, 2009. Send comments to Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-ORD-2007-0517 to ORD.Docket@epa.gov, or by posting them online to www.regulations.gov.
In late February 2009, EPA will publish a draft scope and methods plan for the Risk and Exposure Assessment for Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) review and public comment.
The CASAC PM panel will meet on April 1-2, 2009 to review the draft ISA and scope and methods plan, and public comments will be entertained at that meeting, with an option for call-in comments.
The draft report applies a five-level hierarchy for causal determination:
– Causal relationship
– Likely to be a causal relationship
– Suggestive of a causal relationship
– Inadequate to infer a causal relationship
– Suggestive of no causal relationship
It evaluates evidence regarding the concentration-response relationships including levels and exposure durations at which effects were observed, and subpopulations that were more susceptible or vulnerable to PM exposure than the general population. The result is a finding for each pollutant (PM10, PM2.5, coarse particles) and each health endpoint, which will feed into future analyses and the rulemaking.
