Daily Variation of Lipid Regulators and Personal Care Products in a River Impacted by Domestic Effluents in Southern Brazil

Abstract

In urban areas, wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) play a major role in the water quality of rivers. The removal efficiency of emerging contaminants by WWTPs is strongly correlated with the type of treatment and the hydraulic retention time (HRT) of the process, which can vary according to the volumetric influent flow of wastewater and occasional peak flows. This paper aims, for the first time, to assess the daily variation of lipid regulators and personal care products in an urban river impacted by domestic effluents. Samples were collected upstream and downstream of a WWTP. The concentrations downstream of the effluent discharge were higher than upstream, but they varied significantly during the day. Concentration peaks upstream of the WWTP were detected at 07:00, 15:00 and 21:00, while downstream of the effluent discharge, concentration peaks occurred between 13:00 and 19:00 and between 21:00 and 23:00. The highest downstream concentrations of triclosan and methylparaben (420 ng L−1 and 460 ng L−1) were 6.8 and 5.4 times higher than the lowest concentrations detected, respectively. These results show that in WWTP-impacted rivers, the time of the sampling has a great influence on the final results and conclusions of a monitoring study.

Temporal Analysis of Pharmaceuticals as Emerging Contaminants in Surface Water and Wastewater Samples: A Case Study

“…The results indicate an increase in both the number of detected analytes and their total concentrations along the river course, with the highest values generally observed downstream of both WWTPs (SP3 and SP5), highlighting their influence on the river (see Figure 3 B). Goulart et al similarly noted higher concentrations downstream of effluent discharge, underscoring the significant role of WWTPs in pollutant presence and concentration variation in rivers [ 44 ].…”