Final ORD Research Plans and Strategies
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INTRODUCTION
Research strategies frame the scientific questions associated with important environmental issues and delineate the research needs and relative priorities required to address those questions. Research strategies provide the link between the ORD Strategic Plan and the research plans. Research plans provide a more detailed description of ORD's research program. Research plans identify outputs and outcomes and provide the link between the research strategy and laboratory implementation plans.
The first set of ORD research strategies and plans cover the six high-priority researchtopics identified in the ORD Strategic Plan and certain other key research program areas. We estimate that these strategies and plans cover over two-thirds of ORD's research program, including the associated STAR grants. Other aspects of ORD's program will either be captured under these strategies/plans or will be addressed in strategies/plans to be developed in subsequent years.
Federal Register Notice, [FRL - 6915-7] - Vol. 65, No. 239, December 12, 2000 - Availability of Strategy for Research on Environmental Risks to Children
Strategy for Research on Environmental Risks to Children (PDF, 1821K)
ABSTRACT:
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) Office of Research and Development (ORD) is pleased to announce the availability of its Strategy for Research on Environmental Risks to Children. This document provides the strategic direction for ORD's research program in children's health.
EPA is committed to promoting a safe and healthy environment for children by ensuring that all EPA regulations, standards, policies, and risk assessments consider special childhood vulnerabilities to environmental pollutants. Environmental health threats to children are often difficult to recognize and assess because of limited understanding of when and why children's exposures and responses are different from those of adults.
ORD has prepared the Strategy for Research on Environmental Risks to Children to strengthen the scientific foundation of the EPA risk assessments and risk management decisions that affect children. ORD strategies provide a framework of research needs and priorities to guide its programs over the next five to ten years. They form the basis for more detailed research plans, which in turn link to individual ORD laboratory implementation plans. The Strategy for Research on Environmental Risks to Children includes a stable, long-term, core program of research in hazard identification, dose-response assessment, exposure assessment, and risk management, as well as problem-oriented research that addresses current critical needs identified by EPA Program Offices and Regions.
The strategy describes the current ORD research program for children's health and its relation to research in other Federal agencies, descriptions of which were obtained from publically-available sources. It outlines research program directions aimed at development of data to reduce uncertainties in risk assessment, risk assessment methods and models, new approaches to data collection, and risk prevention and reduction methods.The strategy encompasses research performed by EPA in-house scientists and research supported through ORD's Science to Achieve Results (STAR) grants program.
A team of scientists from the ORD national laboratories and centers; the Office of Prevention, Pesticides, and Toxic Substances; the Office of Water; and the Office of Children's Health Protection developed the strategy. The internal review was conducted by the Associate Directors for Health of ORD's three national laboratories and the National Center for Environmental Assessment. The external peer review was conducted by a group of experts that convened at a workshop in Washington, DC, on November 9 and 10, 1999. The strategy reflects the comments of the internal and external reviewers and the EPA Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee.
Contact Karen Hammerstrom: at hammerstrom.karen@epamail.epa.gov
ABSTRACT:
The "Waste Research Strategy" covers research necessary to support both the proper management of solid and hazardous wastes and the effective remediation of contaminated waste sites. This research includes improving the assessment of existing environmental risks, as well as developing more cost-effective ways to reduce those risks. Prepared by EPA's Office of Research and Development (ORD), the strategy responds to two major legislative mandates and large programs within the EPA, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) and the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA, or "Superfund") and their amendments. This strategy identifies four research areas that correspond to the major waste-related environmental problems (contaminated ground water, contaminated soils and the vadose zone [subsurface region above the ground water table], emissions from waste combustion facilities, and active waste management facilities). The strategy prioritizes research activities that ORD should undertake through Fiscal Year 2000 (FY00).
Interested parties can obtain a single copy of the report by contacting EPA's National Service Center for Environmental Publications (NSCEP) at (800) 490-9198. When contacting NSCEP, please provide your name and mailing address, and request publication number EPA/600/R-98/154 dated February 1999.
Contact Ben Blaney: at blaney.ben@epamail.epa.gov
To order paper copies of the Waste Research Strategy call: (800) 490-9198.
ABSTRACT:
One of the strategic goals of the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is to preventpollution and reduce risk in communities, homes, workplaces, and ecosystems. This goal must be based in large part on the application of the best available science and technology associated with a preventive approach. The Office of Research and Development's (ORD's) Pollution Prevention Research Strategy describes the Agency's research and development program in pollution prevention for the next five years. It is designed around the vision that scientifically-based pollution prevention research and development products will be used routinely for improved environmental decision making on high-risk human health and environmental problems. Such would be done as part of a move toward sustainable development in the 21st Century. In realizing the above vision, the mission of ORD's pollution prevention research and development program will be to advance scientific research and develop cost-effective tools, methods, technologies, and approaches which expand the availability and use of pollution prevention by both the public and private sectors. The research strategy focuses on four objectives in order to achieve this mission: (1) delivering broadly applicable tools and methodologies for pollution prevention and sustainability, (2) developing and transferring pollution prevention technologies and approaches, (3) verifying selected pollution prevention technologies, and (4) conducting research to address economic, social and behavioral research for pollution prevention.
Contact Jonathan Herrmann: at herrmann.jonathan@epamail.epa.gov.
To order paper copies of the Pollution Prevention Research Strategy call: (800) 490-9198.
ABSTRACT:
This research strategy was developed to provide a roadmap for the EPA Office of Research and Development's program on endocrine disruptors. It was developed by a team of scientists representing all of ORD's National Laboratories and Centers and is intended to provide guidance to both the intramural research program and the extramural grants program in terms of research priorities and the pacing of the research programs over the next five years (e.g., the need for risk management activities is recognized, but efforts are not scheduled to begin in earnest for several years as we strive to better comprehend the extent, magnitude, and sources of the biological effects). The plan recognizes that there is a great deal of research in this area being funded by the federal government and seeks to emphasize those areas where EPA can make a substantitive and meaningful contribution. The plan has been circulated through the CENR (Committee on the Environment and National Resources) Working Group on Endocrine Disruptors that is coordinating efforts across the federal government. Briefly, the plan addresses research needs in the areas of biological effects (both for human health and wildlife) and exposure assessment. Importantly, it also contains a "linkage" section that strives to integrate effects and exposure research to provide a more complete analysis of the risks than has generally been done in the past for endocrine disruptors. It is the intent of this strategy that specific projects will be chosen for funding following peer review of proposals submitted under targeted RFAs during each budget year. These RFAs will be based on the overall strategy, and fine tuned each year to ensure the appropriate balance and mix of research given progress achieved in prior years. With its risk assessment based organizational structure, ORD is in a unique position to provide national leadership in this important public health issue.
Contact: Robert Kavlock at kavlock.robert@epamail.epa.gov.
ABSTRACT:
In virtually every major environmental act, Congress has required that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) not only ensure that the air is safe to breathe, the water safe to drink, and the food supply free of contamination, but also that it protect the environment. As a result, EPA's Office of Research and Development (ORD) has established ecological protection as one of the highest priority research areas for investment over the next five years. Within this context and recognizing the work underway and proposed by other agencies during the last year, scientists within ORD have developed an Ecological Research Strategy. This document serves primarily to guide planning and implementation of the in-house research program, but also discusses extramural research needs in key areas.
The ORD Ecological Research Strategy focuses on the single, broad goal: Provide the scientific understanding required to measure, model, maintain and/or restore, at multiple scales, the integrity and sustainability of ecosystems now and in the future. The research is organized around four fundamental areas of research needed by the Agency and in which ORD has made significant contributions traditionally. These research areas are: (1) ecosystem monitoring; (2) ecological processes and modeling; (3) ecological risk assessment; and (4) ecological risk management and restoration. Within this comprehensive framework, research objectives and priorities are presented in terms of what basic science capabilities are needed to maintain focused, core research competencies and for how these capabilities may be used to address high priority environmental threats.
The strategy was developed after an assessment of the current capability and capacity of the scientific resources in ORD coupled with the current and future needs of the EPA Program and Regional Offices. It also considers other Agency activities and proposed research to complement and not duplicate those programs.
The ORD Ecological Research Strategy further articulates the current and future direction of the program within the context of the Agency's Government Performance and Results Act commitments, establishes the long-term program goals and objectives, and documents the rationale for the chosen program direction. While the strategy delineates the research areas comprising the overall Ecological Research Program, the specifics for these research areas -- including the scientific approach at the individual project level, and the anticipated project products, performance measures and specific schedules -- will be included in subsequent research plans for specific areas of research and in Laboratory/Center implementation plans and are not a part of this strategy.
Contact Rick Linthurst: at linthurst.rick@epamail.epa.gov.
ABSTRACT:
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Office of Research and Development (ORD) develops research plans to guide its research direction pertaining to specific environmental issues over a 5- to 10-year time frame. This research plan addresses opportunities to enhance the scientific basis for understanding the health risks associated with arsenic in drinking water as well as research to support improved control technologies for water treatment. Better understanding of arsenic health risks will provide an improved science base for arsenic risk assessment and regulatory decisions in the United States. Further evaluation of control technologies will support cost-effective implementation of future regulatory requirements.
Contact Lynn Papa: at papa.lynn@epamail.epa.gov.
ABSTRACT:
This research plan was developed to describe research needed to support EPA‚s development of drinking water regulations concerning disinfectants, disinfection by-products (DBPs) and microbial pathogens, focusing on key scientific and technical information needed. The research plan was developed by a team of scientists from EPA‚s National Laboratories and Centers, within the Office of Research and Development, and from the Office of Water. The Plan is intended to provide guidance to both the intramural research program and the extramural grants program in terms of research priorities and sequencing of research. The challenge in providing safe drinking water today lies in reaching an acceptable balance among competing risks from microbial contamination and disinfection by-products. Research is needed to obtain a better understanding of these risks and how to reduce them through water treatment and other means. The research plan addresses research needs in the areas of exposure, health effects, risk assessment and risk management for both microbial pathogens and disinfection by-products. The EPA also has been using this research plan as a vehicle for discussion with outside groups, including those who participated in the DBP regulatory negotiation, and as a tool to promote coordination and cooperation among various agencies, private organizations, and universities involved in DBP research, in the context of broader research coordination efforts. The Plan has been reviewed by the Science Advisory Board, and by other agencies and stakeholder groups, and was revised to reflect many of their recommendations and to update developments in the state of the science since 1995.
Contact Bruce Peirano: at peirano.bruce@epamail.epa.gov.
 Draft Research Strategies and Plans are also available from the Office of Research and Development.
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