ABSTRACT
The review of issues and practices in the derivation and use of species sensitivity distributions (SSDs) (Suter et al., Chapter 21) shows that two facts are relevant to the developments of SSDs. First, many debates on the advantages and disadvantages of SSDs have not yet been resolved; a selection of issues is given in Table 22.1. Second, despite these unresolved issues, SSDs are currently used in practice, as shown in Table 22.2 with details in the preceding chapters. The use of SSDs in derivation of environmental quality criteria, risk assessment, and even life cycle assessment of industrial products (Chapters 15 through 20) shows the breadth of subdisciplines in which SSD-based results can be used, and underlines the importance of further development of SSD-based risk assessment methods.
