Nowadays monitoring pharmaceutical residues from surface waters is a widespread analytical task. Most of the studies are conducted from river waters or sewage treatment plants and mainly in Western Europe or North America. Such studies are seldom published from Eastern Europe, especially from stream waters, even though the prescription and consumption patterns of drugs as well as wastewater tre...

The environmental sustainability of a semi-industrial solar photo-Fenton reactor, treating real effluents emanating from a pharmaceutical laboratory, is assessed herein. The life cycle assessment/analysis (LCA) methodology was employed and real life cycle inventory (LCI) data was collected from a ferrioxalate-assisted homogeneous solar photo-Fenton wastewater treatment plant (WWTP), at Ciudad R...

We present and evaluate a framework for estimating concentrations of pharmaceuticals over time in wildlife feeding at wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). The framework is composed of a series of predictive steps involving the estimation of pharmaceutical concentration in wastewater, accumulation into wildlife food items, and uptake by wildlife with subsequent distribution into, and elimination...

There is growing concern from the scientific community that pharmaceutical compounds are not treated sufficiently by current wastewater treatment methods and therefore trace amounts of such compounds are being identified in surface water, ground water and sewage effluents. Advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) are now being proposed for the specific treatment of industrial wastewaters and wastewa...

Pharmaceutical substances and their residues are increasingly present in the environment. Therefore, attempts at their removal are made by using different processes. Increasingly important among these processes are those modeled on natural phenomena which occur in wetland ecosystems, called technical scale constructed wetlands. Microbial degradation is an important process in these constructed ...

A series of sodium bentonite and thiamine were used as raw materials to prepare a new adsorbent – thiamine-modified bentonite. The adsorbent was applied in the pretreatment of pharmaceutical wastewater. The optimum preparation conditions of thiamine-modified bentonite were studied. The experiments showed that the removals of COD (chemical oxygen demand) reached 47.98 % under optimal condition. ...

Carbamazepine, an anti-epileptic pharmaceutical agent commonly found in wastewater, is highly recalcitrant to standard wastewater treatment practices. This study investigated the mixture toxicity of carbamazepine transformation products formed during ultraviolet (UV) photolysis using three standard ecotoxicity assays (representing bacteria, algae and crustaceans). UV-treatment of 6 mg L(-1) car...

To develop a better understanding of the issues and best practices related to the use of treated effluent to help maintain river flows and habitat, the Conservancy commissioned a study to summarize the state of the science. The use of treated wastewater effluent is becoming a more prominent factor in Arizona’s overall water management strategy. Treated effluent contains a wide array of chemical...

Developing professional competencies require learning experiences that simulate authentic practice. A wastewater treatment course at a large, research university converted a portion of its traditional lecture and homework model of instruction to a challenge-based model of instruction culminating in a redesign project. The course used a series of challenge-based modules as a precursor to learner...

Wastewater from the fertiliser industry is characterised by high chloride concentration, normally varying between 60 and 76 g/ l. Experiments with biological denitrification were performed in laboratory-scale ‘fill and draw’ reactors with synthetic fertiliser wastewater, with chloride concentrations up to 96.7 g Cl/l at 37°C; the pH was controlled in the range 6.8 to 7.2. Potassium acetate was ...