Effect-based assessment of toxicity removal during wastewater treatment

摘要: Wastewaters contain complex mixtures of chemicals, which can cause adverse toxic effects in the receiving environment. In present study, toxicity removal during wastewater treatment at seven municipal plants (WWTPs) was investigated using an effect-based approach. A battery eight bioassays applied comprising cytotoxicity, genotoxicity, endocrine disruption and fish embryo assays. Human cell-based CALUX assays, transgenic larval models test were particularly sensitive to WWTP effluents. The results indicate that most significantly reduced or completely removed (76–100%), while toxicity, estrogenic activity thyroid still detectable effluents suggesting some harmful substances remain after treatment. responsiveness compared human assays showed highest samples. Additionally, for disrupting high low sample concentrations nearly all effluent a similar effect pattern among WWTPs investigated, indicating composition could be rather different locations. There no considerable differences efficiencies correlation observed with characteristics, such as process configuration sludge age. This study demonstrated biotest multiple endpoints serve powerful tool when assessing water quality efficiency holistic manner. Rather than analyzing few selected used complement traditional methods monitoring future by sum-parameter based effects, mixture tackling chemicals are below chemical analytical detection limits.