EPA's Research Needs: Looking Forward

The Environmental Protection Agency needs to focus its research on several areas of emerging concern, including detection of nanomaterials, former leaders of EPA's science program said on May 17.

Five former EPA assistant administrators for the Office of Research & Development (ORD) returned to Washington, D.C., to speak at the agency's annual science forum about challenges facing ORD. Their service at EPA spanned from the Administration of Ronald Reagan to that of George W. Bush. Some gave concrete recommendations for EPA research, while others offered general statements about ORD.

Robert J. Huggett, who led a major reorganization of ORD when he was its chief between 1994 and 1997 during the Clinton Administration, made a number of specific suggestions for EPA research.

Nanotechnology products pose a major challenge for EPA, which up to now has addressed only conventional chemicals as pollutants, Huggett said. No standard methods exist for detecting nanomaterials, he noted, nor are there standard protocols for conducting bioassays with nanoparticles. The agency needs analytical tools and testing protocols for nanomaterials, said Huggett, who is a consultant and a former vice president of Michigan State University.

EPA also needs to investigate the presence and impacts of pharmaceuticals and personal care products in rivers, streams, and lakes, Huggett continued. Some of these chemicals can cause endocrine disruption in animals, and their presence could explain why male fish in reaches of some rivers are producing eggs, he asserted. What to do about these products in surface waters is an emerging policy issue, he said.

Huggett even suggested a regulatory strategy—that drugs come under the scrutiny of EPA as well as the Food & Drug Administration if the pharmaceuticals get into surface waters. EPA has the necessary statutory authority, he stated.

George M. Gray, ORD's leader since November 2005, said the emerging issues Huggett noted are "trickier problems" than the issues EPA has dealt with during its first 35 years, such as controlling the discharge of untreated sewage (C&EN, May 15, page 38). In the case of lifesaving drugs that have adverse effects on the environment, EPA will have to figure out how to weigh the benefits people get from those drugs versus the cost of their environmental impacts, Gray said.

Norine E. Noonan, who led ORD for two years at the end of the Clinton Administration, emphasized EPA's investigation into mitigation and adaptation to climate change as part of the U.S. Global Climate Research Program. The lion's share of the budget for this government-wide science program goes for climate modeling and collecting satellite data, she pointed out. But EPA's efforts will be crucial as the U.S. begins to feel the effects of a changing climate, said Noonan, who is dean of mathematics and science at the College of Charleston, in South Carolina.

Huggett also said EPA needs to expand its research on the mitigation of and adaptation to the predicted effects of climate change, especially sea-level rise. "We're not going to build a dike around the U.S." to ward off rising seas, he said. Huggett suggested the agency investigate the effects on coastal ecosystems of the anticipated inundation of landfills, industrial property, Superfund sites, and agricultural lands.

J. Paul Gilman, who headed ORD for two-and-a-half years during the first term of President George W. Bush, pointed out that EPA is in a unique position among most federal regulatory agencies because it still has a significant R&D program. The research arm of FDA has faded, he said, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's research efforts are considerably smaller than they were a decade ago.

Yet EPA's research program is also shrinking, pointed out David E. Blockstein, senior scientist with the National Council for Science & the Environment. The council has worked for years to boost ORD's budget, which has been flat, at about $600 million a year, since 1990, he told C&EN. Funding for ORD would drop to $557 million under President Bush's proposal for fiscal 2007.

At the science forum, Blockstein asked the former ORD leaders how the scientific community outside of EPA could make the case that ORD's budget is too small.

Gray was not convinced such action was necessary. "We can do everything we need to do with the resources we have," he said, adding that ORD would leave "mature" areas of research behind and move into new areas.

Noonan responded, "Stop earmarks." She referred to the pet projects that members of Congress insert into the federal budget. They are not requested by the executive branch and can divert funds from agency's priorities.

Huggett believes that EPA's research program needs grassroots support from scientists. When Congress considers the budgets of the National Institutes of Health or the National Science Foundation, researchers who get funding from these agencies flood congressional appropriators with e-mails in support of boosting funding for these programs, he pointed out. "EPA has no constituency like that," Huggett said. He recommended that the National Council for Science & the Environment urge scientists, and not just lobbyists, to push lawmakers for increased ORD funding.

"I'm convinced this will get better," Huggett said about ORD funding. He later told C&EN, "It can't get any worse."