Treatment or purification of water is considered as a critical challenge especially in developing countries since this treatment is an essential facility to conserve the public health and environment by eliminating of waterborne diseases and pathogens. This study was made to assess the efficiency of Khanaqin City water treatment plant (KCWTP) which is the main source to supply drinking water in Khanaqin City, and to evaluate the treated water quality that reached to city residents. Khanaqin City water treatment plant (KCWTP) consists of conventional water treatment units like other treatment plants in Iraq of flocculation, sedimentation, filtration, and disinfection. These treatments have been studied depending on the collected information and tests. In this research, several physicochemical and bacteriological parameters of both the raw and treated water were sampled and studied according to Standard Methods and Procedures to evaluate the performance and quality of treated water from Khanaqin City Water Treatment Plant (KCWTP). The results indicated that the source raw water is moderately of poor quality, while the treated water is relatively satisfactory. The treatment process units in KCWTP were also evaluated. Overall removal efficiency of water turbidity in KCWTP is 97.88%. The study suggests that the KCWTP units and process operation need to be improved, rescaled, and redesigned to enhance the plant efficiency and reduce the possibilities of waterborne diseases and contamination that may occur in future in Khanaqin City drinking water.

Drinking water of safe quality is a critical issue for human survival and health. Water pollution by heavy metals is very crucial because of their toxicity. This study assesses potential of heavy metals pollution in drinking water in Garmian Region, East Iraq. Water samples were investigated for 23 heavy metals and 6 chemical contaminants collected from 16 locations. The analysis was performed by using coupled plasma optical emission spectroscopy (ICPOES, Spectro Arcos). High levels of Al, Se, Sr, and Fe have been detected at certain locations in study area. Statistical analysis techniques of the correlation matrix (CM), and cluster hierarchical analysis (CA) were conducted. The heavy metals pollution index (HPI), heavy metals evaluation index (HEI), and contamination Index (Cd) were used applied. These indices linked with the statistical analysis to interpret relationships among the tested parameters in water samples and to investigate the pollution sources over the study region. Even with the significant correlations between the HPI, Cd, and HEI, they showed dissimilar impact of examined heavy metals on the water quality. The most reliable pollution evaluation index of HEI for drinking water showed that 44% of the water samples is critically polluted. Sources of the contamination are most likely coming from natural geological sources. Anthropogenic impact was only noticed at several sites in the study area.

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Satisfactory effluent characteristics are indispensable to evaluate the performance of any wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) design. Dynamic simulation software has a great role in pursuing this objective, in which an efficient and cost-effective design is constantly performed. In this study, a dynamic simulator sewage treatment operation analysis over time (STOAT) has been used under certain influent conditions to optimize design possibilities for modifying an existing primary WWTP College of Engineering Wastewater Treatment Plant (COEWWTP) at Erbil, Kurdistan, Iraq. The optimization was established on the basis of total suspended solids (TSS) and biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) characteristics in the effluent. Two alternative design schemes were proposed; trickling biofilter and aeration basin. In the dynamic simulation for the investigated design schemes, the predicted effluent profile showed that each of the existing and trickling biofilter processes has failed to correspond to the valid effluent limitation, whereas predicted results of the aeration basin exhibited an effluent profile that meets TSS and BOD allowable limits. Different simulation models have been implemented by STOAT to simulate treatment processes in studied design approaches: ASAL 1 model; BOD model; BOD semi-dynamic model; and SSED 1 model. This study offers an additional understanding of WWTP design and facilitates the application of dynamic simulators as tools for wastewater treatment development in Kurdistan.

Environmental contamination is increasingly becoming a matter of a great g lobal issue (Oke 2004). Contamination of commercial products and foodstuff with toxic elements is now a vital factor concerning human health (Kakimov et al. 2013; Stef and Gergen 2012). Plastic toys are objects that very often used by children and infants for play ing and enjoyment. Toys and other infant care products are necessary factors during the progression of the infant's life (Landrigan et al. 2004). Therefore the exposure to a number of toxic elements and heavy metals presented in in fants are possibly greater through the mouthing of toys and non-food products (Landrigan and Gold man 2011). Many infant and childcare products may contain various harmfu l co mponents such as toxic elements and heavy metals in their co mpositions (Becker et al. 2010). Hence the main potential source of exposure and transfer of dangerous chemicals and toxic elements to infants is through their toys (Decharat 2017; Earls et al. 2003). Despite the fact, the heavy metals are naturally existing in soil and rocks (Marcovecchio et al. 2007). To xic elements like heavy metals are considered as the most detrimental contaminants regarding their nonbiodegradable behavior (Kopp et al. 2018). They tend to accumulate in b iological systems like the human body (Kim et al. 2015). Heavy metals present in the environ ment may involve essential and to xic heavy metals (Issa and Alshatteri 2018; Mah mood et al. 2012). The essential metals are Co,