Our series EcoHomeLife Explains explores terms and concepts around the topic of sustainability. We explain briefly and in simple terms everyone can understand. This edition answers the question: What is bioaccumulation in environmental terms?
As part of my quest to live a more sustainable life, I do a lot of research to find out how my actions impact on the environment. When looking into the effects of the things I use, I came across the term bioaccumulation.
Understanding the term and the concept behind it helped me a lot to understand the impact certain products I used have. For example, cleaning products but also personal care products such as deodorants and sun creams.
So in this edition of EcoHomeLife Expains I will explain what bioaccumulation is and why it’s important in environmental terms.
What Bioaccumulation Means
The term is made up of two words: “bio” and “accumulation”. The former comes from the Greek word “bios” and means “life”. The latter has its root in the latin word “accumulare” which means “to heap up” or “amass”.
So bioaccumulation means that something is built up or accumulated in a living organism. When the term is used in biology, the build up refers to chemicals, normally harmful ones like pollutants. The living organism can’t excrete or break them down, or at least not fast enough, hence why the harmful chemicals build up.
A good example to illustrate this concept is car emissions. They are inhaled by humans and animals on a daily basis, especially if they live near a busy road. The emission particles reach the lung, and they stay there for a while.
As the organisms are exposed to more pollution every day, bioaccumulation occurs, as the chemicals build up in the lungs. While the lungs might be able to cope with low levels of these chemicals, as more and more are inhaled, they can cause real harm.
Another term often is used at the same time as bioaccumulation and that’s biomagnification. So what does it mean?
It describes how the harmful chemicals that accumulate in organisms lower down in the food chain move up the chain until they reach us humans. The harmful substances are magnified to the point that its concentration gets higher than that of the actual food.
In other words: the organisms higher up the food chain take up more harmful chemicals than food due to biomagnification. So bioaccumulation isn’t just a problem for the creatures that are exposed to the harmful substances in the first place.
It also impacts on others that eat these organisms and are in turn eaten themselves until it reaches us humans, who are on top of the food chain.
The Build-Up Of Harmful Chemicals In The Environment
So far so good. But what is bioaccumulation in environmental terms? Scientists use the concept of bioaccumulation to assess the health of various ecosystems.
For example, if they find certain pollutants in high concentrations in aquatic life in a river, they know that these pollutants find their way into these waterways on a regular basis. Not only will this tell them the health of the ecosystem, but it also allows them to show that the ecosystem is exposed to harmful chemicals. (Van der Oost et al., 2002)
That’s because often it’s not possible to measure the presence of certain chemicals in water. But it can be measured in marine life.
One of the things I realised as I learned about the concept of bioaccumulation is that even though many products are classed as safe to use, they really aren’t. Let’s take cleaning products as an example. We know that they contain many harsh chemicals.
And there are regulations in place in many countries that regulate the use of these substances. The EU chemicals regulation REACH, to which the UK has been adhering until it left the EU, asses and restricts or bans chemicals for use.
Many cleaning chemicals are included in this list due to their harmfulness. If they are restricted, only a certain amount is allowed to be used, which is deemed safe.
However, this is when bioaccumulation comes in. Because the assumption is that if the amount that is deemed safe were to reach the environment, it wouldn’t be harmful. But because of bioaccumulation, the amount of harmful substances will increase over time.
So limiting the amounts of toxic chemicals doesn’t keep our environment from harm due to bioaccumulation. What can we do?
Switch To Eco-Friendly Products
Now that we answered the question of what is bioaccumulation, we inevitably come to the question of how to counteract it. I started to ask myself: What can I do to reduce the impact I have on our environment?
Learning about bioaccumulation has made one thing clear to me: there isn’t such a thing as a safe limit. The logical consequence is that we have to stop using products that contain these harmful substances.
And it’s not just about cleaning products, although they contain some of the harshest chemicals, but all sorts of products we use. Such as personal care products, like deodorants, sunscreens, make-up, shampoos, etc.
Instead, we need to switch to eco-friendly equivalents. And I’m pleased to say that they do exist. You can buy eco-friendly cleaning products that only use plant-based, biodegradable ingredients. Sustainable deodorants don’t just contain eco-friendly ingredients, but are also plastic-free.
I have found laundry detergents that are safer for our environment, and green shampoo bars that get rid of plastic and harmful surfactants. Many small companies have made it their mission to put the planet at the heart of their business and help us to live a more sustainable life.
Little by little, we can start to replace harmful products with safer ones. And our planet will thank us for it.
