Deriving environmental quality standards for perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and related short chain perfluorinated alkyl acids

The evidence that in Northern Italy significant sources of perfluoroalkylacids (PFAA) are present inducedthe Italian government to establish a Working Group on Environmental Quality Standard (EQS) for PFAAin order to include some of them in the list of national specific pollutants for surface water monitoringaccording to the Water Framework Directive (2000/60/EC). The list of substances included perfluorooc-tanoate (PFOA) and related short chain PFAA such as perfluorobutanoate (PFBA), perfluoropentanoate(PFPeA), perfluorohexanoate (PFHxA) and perfluorobutanesulfonate (PFBS), which is a substitute of per-fluorooctanesulfonate. For each of them a dossier collects available data on regulation, physico-chemicalproperties, emission and sources, occurrence, acute and chronic toxicity on aquatic species and mammals,including humans.Quality standards (QS) were derived for the different protection objectives (pelagic and benthic com-munities, predators by secondary poisoning, human health via consumption of fishery products andwater) according to the European guideline. The lowest QS is finally chosen as the relevant EQS. ForPFOA a QS for biota was derived for protection from secondary poisoning and the corresponding QS