Handbook of Environmental Chemistry

Human Health Risk Assessment (HHRA) and Environmental Risk Assessment (ERA) are well-established regulatory and scientific research fields that support regulatory decision-making in the European Union (EU) and are undergoing constant development. HHRA and ERA are crucial steps for reaching the objectives of Europe 2020, a strategy put forward by the Commission that sets out a vision of Europe’s social market economy for the twenty-first century. This chapter aims to describe the basic principles, the evolution and the future challenges of HHRA and ERA. The first part defines HHRA and ERA and describes the origins of risk assessment and management procedures at an international level. The precautionary principle has always been present in the European Union policies that aim to protect health and the environment. In the second part, current approaches that characterise risk assessment, such as the tiered approach, are presented. In the future, the implementation of recent scientific developments for the construction of integrated exposure scenarios models is of paramount importance to improve environmental and health risk assessment schemes. Moreover, the evaluation of uncertainties in the modelling inputs and outputs and the sensitivity analysis are two key elements to optimise current HHRA and ERA procedures.