Deriving a Chronic Guideline Value for Nickel in Tropical and Temperate Marine Waters.

The absence of chronic toxicity data for tropical marine waters has limited our ability to derive appropriate water quality guideline values for metals in tropical regions. To aid environmental management, temperate data are usually extrapolated to other climatic (e.g. tropical) regions. However, differences in climate, water chemistry and endemic biota between temperate and tropical systems make such extrapolations uncertain. Chronic nickel toxicity data were compiled for temperate (24 species) and tropical (16 species) marine biota and their sensitivities to nickel compared. Effective concentrations to cause a 10% effect (EC10) for temperate biota ranged from 2.9 to 20,300 µg Ni/L, with sea urchin larval development being the most sensitive endpoint. Values for tropical data ranged from 5.5 to 3700 µg Ni/L, with copepod early life-stage development being the most sensitive test. There was little difference in temperate and tropical marine sensitivities to nickel, with 5% hazardous concentrations (HC5) (95% confidence limits) of 4.4 (1.8, 17), 9.6 (1.7, 26) and 5.8 (2.8, 15) µg Ni/L for temperate, tropical and combined temperate and tropical species, respectively. To ensure greater taxonomic coverage, and based on guidance provided in Australia and New Zealand, it is recommended that the combined dataset be used as the basis to generate a jurisdiction-specific water quality guideline of 6 µg Ni/L for 95% species protection applicable to both temperate and tropical marine environments. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.