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Guadiamar River is located in the southwest of the Iberian Peninsula and connects two protected areas in the South of Spain: Sierra Morena and Doñana National Park. It is sited in an area affected by urban, industrial and agriculture sewage pollution and with tradition on intensive mining activities. Most of the studies performed in this area have been mainly focused on the presence of heavy metals and, until now, little is known about the occurrence of other contaminants such as emerging organic pollutants (EOPs). In this work, an analytical method has been optimized and validated for monitoring of forty-seven EOPs in surface water. The analytical method has been applied to study the distribution and environmental risk of these pollutants in Guadiamar River basin. The analytical method was based on solid-phase extraction and determination by liquid chromatography-triple quadrupole-tandem mass spectrometry. The 60 % of the target compounds were found in the analyzed samples. The highest concentrations were found for two plasticizers (bisphenol A and di(2-ethyhexyl)phthalate, mean concentration up to 930 ng/L) and two pharmaceutical compounds (caffeine (up to 623 ng/L) and salicylic acid (up to 318 ng/L)). This study allowed to evaluate the potential sources (industrial or urban) of the studied compounds and the spatial distribution of their concentrations along the river. Environmental risk assessment showed a major risk on the south of the river, mainly due to discharges of wastewater effluents.

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Composting was performed using a mixture of ovine manure and straw. Inoculum was extracted at five different phases of the composting process (18, 23, 28, 33 and 38 days after the start of the composting process) and its effect on reducing biotransformation time was evaluated in the composted ovine manure. The samples were preserved in a deep freezer, then lyophilized to obtain the inoculum, 50g of which was added to each treatment in the second experimental phase. Six treatments were established; C=straw (P)+ovine manure (E), T1=P+ E+inoculum 18 days after the start of the composting process (I18), T2=P+E+I23, T3=P+E+I28, T4=P+E+I33, T5=P+E+I38, with three replications. Treatments were placed in a controlled-environment chamber at 45% relative humidity and 30°C along with flasks containing 50g of material to measure daily production, CO accumulation, temperature, pH, electric conductivity (dS/m), organic matter (%), total nitrogen (%), total carbon (%), C: N ratio, particle size (Tp) and bulk density (g/l). CO production (mg) showed a significant difference (p ≤.05) of treatments T2 and T5 with respect to the others, which demonstrated that the inoculum of these treatments accelerated the dynamics of microorganisms and the composting process. The quality and maturity of the compost are guaranteed as the amount of CO decreases.

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