Micro-pollutants

Pietsch J, Schmidt W, Sacher F, et al. 1995. Pesticides and other organic micro pollutants in the river Elbe. Fresenius J Anal Chem 353 75-82. 

Besides the LCA approach, also risk assessment can be performed analysing the chemical compounds or modelling via predictive exposure models. Both types of approaches have their justification to measure environmental concentrations of chemicals in the environment with laboratory measurement is still the most reliable way for determination. But it goes along with the disadvantage of high investments concerning time and money. Besides that laboratory approaches are limited in terms of space and time, and in consequence, the survey of many micro-pollutants and their... 

Leoni [366] observed that in the extraction preconcentration of organochlo-rine insecticides and PCB s from surface and coastal waters in the presence of other pollutants such as oil, surface active substances, etc., the results obtained with an absorption column of Tenax-Celite are equivalent to those obtained with the continuous liquid-liquid extraction technique. For non-saline waters that contain solids in suspension that absorb pesticides, it may be necessary to filter the water before extraction with Tenax and then to extract the suspended solids separately. Analyses of river and estuarine sea waters, filtered before extraction, showed the effectiveness of Tenax, and the extracts obtained for pesticide analysis prove to be much less contaminated by interfering substances than corresponding extracts obtained by the liquid-liquid technique. Leoni et al. [365] showed that for the extraction of organic micro pollutants such as pesticides and aromatic polycyclic hydrocarbons from waters, the recoveries of these substances from unpolluted waters (mineral and potable waters) when added at the level of 1 xg/l averaged 90%. 

Ocampo-Duque W, Sierra J, Ferre-Huguet N, Schuhmacher M, Domingo JL (2008) Estimating the environmental impact of micro-pollutants in the low Ebro River (Spain) an approach based on screening toxicity with Vibrio fischeri. Chemosphere 72 715-721... 

Micro-pollutants in Hospital Effluent Their Fate, Risk and Treatment Options... 

POSEIDON Assessment of technologies for the removal of pharmaceuticals and personal care products in sewage and drinking water facilities to improve the indirect potable water reuse, 2001-2004), which focussed on the removal capacity of WWTPs and waterworks for the main micro-pollutants... 

These micro-pollutants are also considered emerging contaminants unregulated pollutants which may be candidates for future regulation depending on their potential health effects and the results of monitoring of their occurrence. 

One property, volatilization, does not seem to be a removal pathway of any significance for these micro-pollutants. This is due to the fact that PhCs in general are... 

The removal of PhCs by NF membranes occurs via a combination of three mechanisms adsorption, sieving and electrostatic repulsion. Removal efficiency can vary widely from compound to compound, as it is strictly correlated to (a) the physicochemical properties of the micro-pollutant in question, (b) the properties of the membrane itself (permeability, pore size, hydrophobicity and surface charge) and (c) the operating conditions, such as flux, transmembrane pressure, rejections/recovery and water feed quality. 

A biological step is always necessary to remove the carbonaceous fraction from the influent wastewater suspended biomass treatments are the most common. These entail long SRTs (>25-30 d), and compartmentalization of the biological reactor is necessary for the removal of recalcitrant compounds. Furthermore, as many micro-pollutants tend to adsorb/absorb to the biomass flocks, efficient solid/ liquid separation can greatly improve their removal from wastewater and, at the same time, guarantee consistently good effluent quality. MBRs have been suggested for this purpose by many authors [9, 58, 80, 93], some of whom found that ultrafiltration (UF) membranes are more efficient than MF membranes [9, 93]. 

Kimura K., G. Amy, J.E. Drewes, T. Heberer, T-U. Kim, and Y. Watanabe (2003). Rejection of organic micro-pollutants (disinfection by-products, endocrine disrupting compounds, and pharmaceutically active compounds) by NF/RO membranes. Journal of Membrane Science 227 113-121. 

Ternes, T. and Joss, A. (eds) (2006) Human Pharmaceuticals, Hormones and Fragrances. The Challenge of Micro-Pollutants in Urban Water Management, IWA Publishing, London. 

Clauson-Kaas, J., Hoibye, L. and Jacobsen, B.N. (2008) Weighing environmental advantages and disadvantages of advanced wastewater treatment of micro-pollutants using environmental life cycle assessment. Water Sci. Technol., 57 (1), 27-32. 

Stuer-Lauridsen, F. 2005. Review of passive accumulation devices for monitoring organic micro-pollutants in the aquatic environment. Environ. Pollut. 136 503-524. 

Nyholm, N., Jacobsen, B.N., Pedersen, B.M., Poulsen, O., Damboroj, A., Schultz, B. (1992) Removal of organic micro pollutants at ppb levels in laboratory activated sludge reactors under various operating conditions Biodegradation. Water Res. 26,339-353. 

Human Toxicology of Chlorinated Organic Micro pollutants... 

Application In the balanced vinyl chloride (VCM) process, pure oxygen and ethylene are used in the oxychlorination (also known as oxy) step to convert hydrogen chloride into ethylene dichloride (EDC) with minimum vent gas, and without any micro-pollutant or heavy metals contamination of wastewater, or costly catalyst sludge accumulation. 

High efficiency in removing micro-pollutants by oxidation or mineralization... 

D Silva, K., Fernandes, A., White, S., Rose, M., Mortimer, D. N., Gem, M. (2006) Brominated organic micro-pollutants in the United Kingdom diet - results of the 2003 total diet study. Organohalogen Cpds., 68 770-773. 

THE HEALTH HAZARD OF INDUSTRIAL MICRO POLLUTANTS TRUE OR IMAGINED ... 

In the past a number of micro pollutants have been identified as being discharged into the environment — some because improved analytical techniques permit measurement to lower levels and others which are new originating from more modern processes. 

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