Challenges of the 21st Century - Science For Environmental Protection: The Road Ahead - page 34

The drivers outlined in this chapter are often overlapping and their nature
is changing over time. For example, in the United States, chemical exposures
from industrial facilities are decreasing significantly; dispersed, non-point, and
less controllable exposures from chemicals used in products may represent a
larger percentage of the current chemical burden to ecosystems and humans. As
illustrated by the degradation of the Chesapeake Bay, multiple overlapping fac-
tors, such as land use and changing land-use patterns, population growth, the
agricultural use of fertilizers and pesticides, and direct and non-point chemical
exposures may result in human and environmental effects. The complexity of
these interacting factors in environmental degradation creates great challenges
for environmental science and decision-making.
The siloed, disciplinary approaches that have often been taken to monitor
for and characterize singular types of effects and to develop control measures
will not be sufficient to understand and prevent environmental changes and their
health effects. There is a need for greater attention to understand the complex
systems in which human activities are causing effects and how those effects
interact. Ultimately, prevention of these complex effects will require greater
systematic efforts to understand the way in which products, consumptive sys-
tems (such as energy), communities, and other human activities are designed
and carried out.
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