fragmentary approach: major bottleneck for cessation of micro-pollution

A major bottleneck for a sustainable solution of micro-pollution of water, soil, air and food is the fragmented approach. At present, every link of a product chain consists of different actors, networks and policies. Every actor group develops a different vision about the issue of micro-pollution and its solution. Drawing: Frits Ahleveldt, hikingartist.com

When a risk assessment of micro-pollution is done for one chemical (group) or one environmental compartment like surface water or tap water separately, generally the conclusion is that “no risk exists for public health”, because other exposure routes and cocktail or mixture effects are not taken into account.
 
This fragmentary approach of micro-pollution in research, management and policy:

• underestimates the urgency of the problem;
• hampers the development of concepts like green chemistry and green pharmacy;
• prevents appropriate measures from being taken;
  
• increases the likelihood and risks of taking counterproductive shortterm measures, like passing the problem to other compartments (e.g. the application of contaminated sewage sludge as a soil fertilizer (biosolids); the production of toxic residues by burning sewage sludge; the production of active carbon by destroying peat soils and releasing of CO2; etc.);
  
• generates and prolongates paradigms that inhibit sustainable solutions, e.g. the idea that water could be fully cleaned creates, maintains and strengthens activities that pollute water;
• discourages source oriented policies by large investments in end-of-pipe-solutions, such as the investments made in flue gas cleaning for domestic waste incinerators;
• is not sustainable, as hightech end-of-pipe-solutions like ozonation of sewage generate a new toxic waste stream, entailing high energy costs and high CO2 emissions.