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Fate, exposure and effect measures provide a basis
for the calculation of characterisation factors in Life Cycle Assessment
(LCA). Such characterisation factors provide insights
into the relative concern of chemical emissions within and across
life cycle inventories, in the context of toxicological stress to
humans and to ecosystems. A brief overview is presented in this
paper of the available options for toxicological characterisation
and of associated issues that will need to be addressed in future
consensus-building initiatives. An introduction is provided to
issues such as: (1) the benefit of measures calculated at midpoints
versus at endpoints in the toxicological cause-effect chains
(sometimes termed environmental mechanisms); (2) the need to
use multimedia models with spatial resolution; (3) the political
consequences of accounting for variations in population density;
(4) uncertainties in the toxicological potency measures; and
(5) the different options for the toxicological endpoint measure(
s). These issues are addressed under the headings of Fate
and Exposure, Human Health and (aquatic) Ecosystem Health.