Removal of 17α‐ethinylestradiol, salicylic acid, trimethoprim, carbamazepine and nonylphenol through biological carbon and nitrogen removal processes

Abstract

This study investigated five different trace organic contaminants (TOrCs) (one hormone: 17a-ethinylestradiol (EE2), two pharmaceuticals: salicylic acid (SA) and trimethoprim (TMP), one analgesic drug: carbamazepine (CBZ), and one surfactant metabolite: nonylphenol (NP)) removal efficiency at a full-scale Advanced Wastewater Treatment Plant (AWTP). The AWTP achieved average EE2, SA and NP removal over 80% at the biological carbon removal stages. The results also showed a 66% removal of TMP at the nitrogen removal stages. CBZ was recalcitrant throughout the plant, due to its high solubility and low distribution coefficient between wastewater and sludge. Batch experiments were conducted on active and inactive secondary, nitrification and denitrification sludge by adding TOrCs to understand the removal mechanism through sorption and biodegradation. Sorption was the dominant mechanism to remove EE2, SA and NP in secondary treatment processes. In nitrification and denitrification processes, higher percentage of TOrCs removal through biodegradation were observed compared to removal through sorption.

Environmental impact and biological removal processes of pharmaceutically active compounds: The particular case of sulfonamides, anticonvulsants and steroid estrogens

“…In this sense, the most commonly studied conjugated metabolite of SMX in full-scale WWTPs is N4-acetyl-SMX (G€ obel et al, 2007), and the sorption of this metabolite can be considered negligible due to its chemical properties (Polesel et al, 2016). CBZ remains recalcitrant in full-scale WWTPs due to its high solubility and low distribution coefficient between wastewater and sludge (Kruglova et al, 2014;Odize et al, 2017;. Moreover, similar results showing slight or no removal were obtained for CBZ and 5 of its metabolites (10,11-dihydro-10,11-dihydroxy-CBZ, 10,11-dihydro-10-hydroxy-CBZ, 10,11-epoxy-10,11-dihydro-CBZ, 2-hydroxy-CBZ and 3-hydroxy-CBZ) in German and Portuguese full-scale WWTPs (Bahlmann et al, 2014).…”

Efficient Removal of Nonylphenol Contamination from Water Using Optimized Magnesium Silicate

“…Hence, the removal of NP from water has attracted widespread attention and various ways have been adopted to relatively eliminate NP from aquatic systems in recent decades [12][13][14][15], including photocatalytic degradation, membrane technology [16,17], biological methods [1,18,19], and adsorption [15,[20][21][22]. The adsorption method is one of the most promising approaches to remove pollutants due to its efficiency, simplicity, and rapid application [21,23].…”