
Background & project objective
The overall aim of TerraChem is to develop, demonstrate and apply a novel systems approach integrating monitoring, environmental modelling, data management, analytical tools and user guidance to better understand exposure of terrestrial biota across trophic levels (from soil and soil water to plants to primary and secondary consumers to apex species) in Europe to the universe of environmentally-relevant anthropogenic chemicals and their damage on terrestrial biodiversity and ecosystem services, with a view to enabling more efficient environmental risk assessment of chemicals in the terrestrial compartment and more effective prevention and mitigation, accelerating achievement of the EU’s zero pollution ambition.
TerraChem’s objectives are: (1) To understand routes of exposure to chemicals in wildlife, including routes and extent of trophic transfer, for selected food chains (from soil and soil water to plants, primary and secondary consumers and apex species) in representative terrestrial ecosystems. (2) To model source-to-receptor pathways of selected chemical contaminants for terrestrial ecosystems, and link organism and species effects to damage on genetic and functional diversity and on relevant ecosystem services. (3) To develop tools and guidance for regulatory and practice uptake of TerraChem research and innovation output to optimise current environmental risk assessment of chemicals and improve risk management measures, and thereby reduce chemical damage to terrestrial biodiversity; and (4) To refine the TerraChem conceptual framework, ensure integration of monitoring (under objective 1), modelling (objective 2) and prevention and mitigation (objective 3), ensure coherence with related project, platform, partnership and policy/regulatory initiatives and pertinence for key end-users, and develop a TerraChem Data Management System and TerraChem Dashboard as a One-Stop Shop for data on contaminants in terrestrial biodiversity in Europe.
Project output
Main project output focuses on the three main aspects that are listed in below table.
Document title | Download file |
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Monitoring | Understand routes of exposure to chemicals in wildlife, including routes and extent of trophic transfer, for selected food chains (from soil and soil water to plants to primary and secondary consumers to apex species) in representative terrestrial ecosystems. The specific objectives of WP1 are to: (1) detect and determine chemicals present, and predominant chemical mixtures, in selected food chains (from plants and primary consumers to apex predators), in representative terrestrial ecosystems. (2) for detected and determined chemicals, understand routes of exposure including routes and extent of trophic transfer. (3) explore patterns for individual contaminants and predominant mixtures in terrestrial trophic chains. (4) elucidate toxic effects of chemical mixtures in terrestrial food chains using an effects-based approach. (5) identify and collate secondary data on contaminants along trophic chains in terrestrial ecosystems in Europe. |
Modelling | Model source-to-receptor pathways of chemicals for terrestrial ecosystems, and link organism effects to damage on species, genetic and functional diversity and on ecosystem services. The specific objectives of WP2 are to: (1) provide a set of terrestrial source-to-receptor pathways for chemicals and compare them against receptor limits for these chemicals. (2) characterise the link between terrestrial ecotoxicity effects to damage on species and genetic diversity. (3) derive metrics and associations for damage on multi-trophic functional diversity and delivery damage on selected ecosystem services. |
Prevention & Mitigation | Facilitate regulatory and practice uptake of monitoring and modelling output to improve environmental risk assessment of chemicals and thereby improve chemical pollution prevention and risk management measures to ultimately reduce the negative effects on biodiversity. The specific objectives of WP3 are to: (1) develop consistent schemes to prioritize chemical risks/damage to terrestrial ecosystems and biodiversity. (2) optimise current ERAs by exploring possible refinements and analysing the feasibility to implement these refinements (novel approaches) into existing ERA practices. (3) trigger RMM and explore innovative alternative measures through an in-depth analysis to reduce damage to biodiversity. |