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  • Original Article
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Contribution of locally grown foods in cumulative exposure assessments

Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology volume 14, pages 60–73 (2004)Cite this article

A Corrigendum to this article was published on 13 September 2004

Abstract

Both laboratory and field studies confirm the importance of vegetation for scavenging semivolatile organic chemicals (SVOCs) from the atmosphere and a number of exposure studies have found that the dietary pathway is often a significant contributor to cumulative exposure for these chemicals. However, little information exists on the atmospheric source-to-dietary intake linkage for SVOCs. Because of higher SVOC emissions to urban regions, this linkage is particularly important for foods that are grown, distributed and consumed in or near urban regions. The food pathway can also contribute to dietary exposure for populations that are remote from a pollutant source if the pollutants can migrate to agricultural regions and subsequently to the agricultural commodities distributed to that population. We use available data, the characteristic travel distance, and the CalTOX multimedia model framework to assess the contribution of local sources of food to cumulative SVOC intake. Based on published concentration data for foods, our exposure calculations indicate that the potential intake through ingestion can be up to 1000 times that of inhalation for certain persistent SVOCs. We use the population-based intake fraction (iF) to determine how SVOC intake can vary among food commodities and exposure pathways, and to determine the contribution of airborne emitted SVOCs to the diet in the Northern Hemisphere. We focus on three representative multimedia SVOCs-benzo(a)pyrene, fluoranthene, and 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin. The approach presented here provides a useful framework and starting point for source-to-intake assessments for the ambient air-to-dietary exposure pathway.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported in part by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) National Exposure Research Laboratory through Interagency Agreement No. DW-988-38190-01-0 and carried out at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) through the US Department of Energy under Contract Grant No. DE-AC03-76SF00098. This work was also supported by the University of California Toxic Substances Research and Teaching Program through a Graduate Student Fellowship. We are very grateful for the assistance in collecting the measured concentrations of SVOCs in foods by Reiko Kobayashi from the University of California, Davis. In addition, we thank Deborah Bennett, Julian Marshall, and Matt Macleod and three anonymous reviewers for their very helpful and relevant comments on prior versions of this manuscript.

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  1. Environmental Health Sciences, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley, California, USA

    Agnes B Lobscheid & Thomas E Mckone

  2. Environmental Energy Technologies Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, One Cyclotron Road, Berkeley, California, MS 90-3058, USA

    Agnes B Lobscheid, Randy L Maddalena & Thomas E Mckone

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  1. Agnes B Lobscheid
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Correspondence to Agnes B Lobscheid.

Appendix

Appendix

Estimating \(\overline{Cj,w}\)

\(\overline{Cj,w}\) is defined as the intake weighted concentration of a particular fvg category. We gathered individual raw (uncooked) fruit, vegetable, and grain concentration (Ci) data from the literature. Unless it was stated otherwise, we assumed that the reported values were the mean concentration in the measured samples. If a given study reported Ci in the form of raw data (rarely), we calculated the arithmetic mean and standard devia-tion. All nondetects (NDs) from the literature were assumed to be zero in developing inputs for the θing/inh(fvg) analysis.

Of 147 reported Ci values, 40 were reported on a fresh weight (FW) basis, 66 were reported on a dry weight (DW) basis, and 41 were reported without designation as to FW or DW basis. All DW Ci values were converted to FW by the following conversion

where W is the mean moisture content (% of edible portion) of individual raw fruits, vegetables, and grains (EPA, 1997; Table 9–27 for fruits and vegetables; Table 12–21 for grains).

For the undesignated Ci values, we calculated a midrange value assuming that the reported concentration represented either a FW or DW basis.

If multiple Ci values were reported for a specific raw fruit, vegetable, or grain, the values were averaged to give C̄i. We realize that by taking the average of averages, we might underspecify the true standard deviation (range) of the distribution of raw fruit, vegetable, and grain concentrations. The final Ci or C̄i values are summarized in Table A1.

For each of the j's (i.e., six fruit and vegetable categories, and grains) the Ci or if available, the C̄i, values were weighted with respect to the intake of each food type, i, for an intake averaged concentration, \(\overline{Ci}\), calculated as

where n is the total number of i's (i.e., individual fvg types) within each category, j; wi are intake-based weighting factors, on an “as-consumed mean per capita” basis (EPA, 1997; Table 9-13 for raw fruits and vegetables and Table 12-12 for grain). We assume here that “as-consumed” is equivalent to FW for all categories except grain; C̄i are the individual fvg concentrations, as summarized in Table A1.

We also calculated a weighted standard deviation (sdw) for the \(\overline{Ci}\)'s, as

where n is the amount of individual fruit and vegetable or grain type, i, for each category, j; N′ is the amount of nonzero weights (i.e., the number of nonzero intakes, Wi); \(\overline{Ci}\) is the non-intake weighted concentration in the ith fvg; \(\overline{Ci}\) is the intake-weighted mean concentration of the specific fvg category, j; wi is the intake-based weighting factor for the ith fruit, vegetable, or grain observation, on an “as-consumed mean per capita” basis (EPA, 1997; Table 9-13 for raw fruits and vegetables and Table 12-12 for grains). Again, we assume here that “as-consumed” is equivalent to FW for food categories except grain.

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Lobscheid, A., Maddalena, R. & Mckone, T. Contribution of locally grown foods in cumulative exposure assessments. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol 14, 60–73 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.jea.7500306

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