Kosmetika är något som används i stor utsträckning i dagens samhälle. Läkemedelsverket är den ansvariga myndigheten för kosmetika och är de som definierar vad begreppet kosmetika innefattar. På EU-nivå är det Kosmetikaförordningen som reglerar vilka ingredienser som får förekomma i kosmetika. För miljöskadliga ämnen ska EU:s kemikalielagstiftning REACH säkerställa att dessa inte får användas. Dock finns det brister i både REACH och Kosmetikaförordningen. Det är därför möjligt att det idag används kosmetiska produkter med ingredienser som är belastande eller till och med farliga för miljön. För att få en tydligare bild av huruvida detta är ett problem, har i detta projekt undersökts ca 1440 kosmetiska ingredienser. Undersökningen har skett med avseende på ingrediensernas persistens, bioackumuleringsförmåga och toxicitet. Projektet har utförts i samarbete med Naturskyddsföreningen. Syftet var att fylla på Naturskyddsföreningens egna kosmetikadatabas med information om vilka ämnen som är klassade som persistenta, bioackumulerande och/eller toxiska. De klassade ingredienserna togs även vidare för att ta reda på om de förekommer ute i svenska vatten. Projektet genomfördes genom att söka upp ingredienserna i ECHA, som är EU:s kemikaliemyndighets databas, där information om ingrediensernas PBT-utredningar fanns att hämta. Ett ämne klassas som PBT om det uppfyller kraven för både persistent, bioackumulerande och toxisk. Ett ämne kan också vara mycket persistent och mycket bioackumulerande, vPvB. De ingredienser som var P, B, T, vP och/eller vB, togs sedan vidare att jämföras med vattenanalysresultat från IVL:s screeningdatabas. En sammanställning gjordes av vilka ämnen som förekom även där, och i vilka halter de uppmätts. Under projektets gång påträffades svårigheter såsom att ganska många ämnen saknade en registrerad PBT-utredning i ECHA. Ämnen som idag inte har någon registrerad PBT-utredning är troligtvis de ämnen som produceras eller importeras i mängder om 1-100 ton/år. Detta eftersom dessa ämnen fått en tidsfrist till år 2018 innan registreringen i ECHA måste göras. Resultatet av projektet blev att av 1440 ämnen kunde endast 880 stycken som hittas i ECHA:s databas. Av dessa hade 300 ämnen en registrerad PBT-utredning, och 270 stycken av dem var inte klassade som persistenta, bioackumulerande eller toxiska. De kvarvarande 30 ämnena var - eller kunde inte uteslutas vara - persistenta, bioackumulerande eller toxiska. Då de 30 ämnena jämfördes mot IVL:s databas, återfanns nio av dem även där. Ämnena förekom i dessa analyser i koncentrationer om upp till 32 μg/l. Zinc pyrithione var det ämne som hade det högst detekterade värdet. Resultatet har också jämförts med tidigare arbeten inom området, och där kan framförallt konstateras att ett ämne som kommit på fråga i flera av dem är Cetrimonium chloride. Under projektets gång har konstaterats att vi i dagens läge inte har riktigt koll på alla de ämnen vi tillåter släpps ut i vår miljö. Kanske man i framtiden borde följa och analysera samtliga ämnen som klassas som persistenta, bioackumulerande och/eller toxiska. Inte bara de som redan är känt miljöfarliga och som importeras/produceras i mängder större än ett ton per år. Slutsatsen blev att av 1440 undersökta ämnen återfanns 30 stycken som är klassade som - eller inte kan uteslutas att vara - persistenta, bioackumulerande eller toxiska. Av dem återfanns nio stycken i IVL:s vattenanalyser. En intressant aspekt är att hela fyra av dessa ämnen, är sådana som används för UV-skydd i kosmetiska produkter. Man bör därför utreda dessa ingredienstyper närmare och försöka hitta bättre alternativ till dem. Särskilt då vi under sommaren smörjer in en stor del av kroppen med produkter innehållandes UV-skydd och sedan badar med det. Det innebär antagligen att det varje år läcker ut relativt stora mängder av dessa miljöbelastande ämnen i våra sjöar och hav, utan att de passerar några reningsverk som skulle kunna rena bort dem. / The use of cosmetics is widely spread in today’s society. In Sweden, the Medical Products Agency (Läkemedelsverket) is the authority responsible for cosmetic products, and they define which products belongs in that category. When it comes to which ingredients a cosmetic product may contain, it is in the European Union defined in the Cosmetics Regulation. For environmentally harmful substances, the REACH Regulation shall make sure these are not used. There are however some shortages in both the REACH and Cosmetics Regulation. Therefore, there may today still be products in use on the market containing ingredients that are harmful to the environment. To get a better picture of whether this is a problem or not, this project has consisted in examining the environmental harmfulness of approximately 1440 cosmetic ingredients. The project was done in cooperation with the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation (Naturskyddsföreningen). The purpose of the project was to supply their database of cosmetic ingredients with another bit of information - if the ingredients are classified as persistent, bioaccumulating and/or toxic. The ingredients that had a classification were then compared to results from analyzes done on Swedish waters. The information of whether the substances were persistent, bioaccumulating and/or toxic, was found in the database of the European Chemicals Agency, ECHA. The results from the water analyzes were found in the database of IVL. An issue that occurred during the project, was that some substances did not have a registered PBT-assessment in ECHA. PBT stands for persistent, bioaccumulating and toxic, and if a substance fulfills the criteria of all these three, it is classified as PBT. A substance can also be vPvB, very persistent and very bioaccumulating. The substances that today are missing a registered PBT-assessment in ECHA, are most likely those that are produced or imported in quantities of 1 000 – 100 000 kilograms per year. This is because these substances have been given time until year 2018 before they have to be registered. The result of the project is that out of 1440 substances, only 880 were found in ECHA. Out of these, 300 substances had a registered PBT-assessment. Among them, 270 were not classified as persistent, bioaccumulating or toxic. The remaining 30 substances had a classification - or could not be entirely excluded. Nine of the remaining 30 substances were found in IVL’s database. These substances turned out to occur in Swedish waters in concentrations of up to 32 μg/liter. The substance with the highest concentration value was Zinc pyrithione. When comparing the result of the project with earlier studies done within this subject, it can be concluded that the substance Cetrimonium chloride occurred in several of them. From the project it can be concluded that we are not fully aware of which substances we let out into our environment today. In the future it would perhaps be better to do water analyzes for all substances that are classified as persistent, bioaccumulating and/or toxic. Not just for the substances that are already known to be environmentally harmful, and imported or produced in amounts of over 1 000 kilograms per year. The overall conclusion of the project was that out of 1440 examined substances, 30 had – or were suspected to may have – a classification as persistent, bioaccumulating or toxic. Nine of these substances were also found in water analysis results from IVL. An interesting fact is, that four out of these substances are used in cosmetic products as UV-protection. Therefore, products containing UV-protection, such as sunscreen, should definitely be examined further, and maybe even the ingredients should be exchanged for better alternate ones in the future. Especially since most of us cover ourselves in sunscreen products during sunny days, and then go swimming in our seas and oceans. This probably causes the release of a large amount of these environmentally harmful ingredients into our waters. Water that does not pass any water treatment plant that could possibly purify it from the substances.

Chemicals offer a wide range of desired functions and are used in a variety of consumer goods and industrial sectors. The number of individual synthetic organic chemicals produced and the total global chemical production volume are increasing. The majority of these anthropogenic chemicals are not monitored in environmental matrices nor in the indoor environment even though some are associated with undesirable consequences and the range of possible chemical impacts is still far from being fully understood. Chemicals that remain in the environment for a long time and/or distribute over a large area have high exposure potential, and will present particularly acute challenges if a currently unknown undesirable effect is discovered.  This thesis describes the development of a set of in silico methods to identify and prioritize chemicals with high exposure potential that are currently not subject to national or international restrictions. In brief, we i) compiled databases of contaminants of potential concern, ii) established models to predict key properties to fill data gaps in the absence of experimental data, and iii) developed and applied methods to screen chemicals to identify those that should be assigned high priority for future study.  Paper I delivers screening-level models to predict partition ratios of organic chemicals between polymeric materials commonly found indoors, and both air and water. These models can be used in high-throughput exposure assessment studies, passive sampling experiments, and models of emissions, fate and transport of chemicals.  Paper II presents a scoring method to prioritize 464 organic chemicals of emerging Arctic concern for their potential to fit a set of four exposure-based hazard profiles. These four profiles represent persistent organic pollutants (POPs) regulated under the Stockholm Convention, very persistent and very bioaccumulative substances (vPvBs) regulated under REACH and for two novel and unregulated profiles derived from the planetary boundary threats framework; airborne persistent contaminants (APCs) and waterborne persistent contaminants (WPCs). APCs and WPCs are chemicals that are mobile in air and water, respectively, and that contaminate the environment in a poorly reversible manner due to their persistence. The prioritization method is based on a reference set of 148 chemicals that is used to contextualize the scoring results.  Paper III describes the prioritization of 8,648 chemicals that were reportedly produced in five OECD countries. Paper III elucidates the relationship between the elemental composition of these chemicals and the exposure-based hazard scores, and presents a strategy to disentangle overlaps among the four exposure hazard profiles by categorizing chemicals according to the spatial coverage of profiles they best fit.  Paper IV focuses on refining the prioritization method described in Papers II and III using a set of 5,600 hypothetical chemicals. The refined method is used to prioritize the chemicals from Papers II and III, and an additional 4,567 chemicals from the REACH database.  The in silico methods developed in this thesis can be applied to conduct screening-level exposure assessments using only chemical structures as a starting point. Substances prioritized as having high potential to be POPs, vPvB, APC, or WPC should be considered for more detailed study to unequivocally determine their identity and physicochemical properties. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defense, the following papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 3: Manuscript. Paper 4: Manuscript.</p>