European Commission, Joint Research Centre (JRC), I-21027 Ispra, VA, Italy.
Water Research Institute IRSA-CNR, Via del Mulino 19, Brugherio 20861, MB, Italy; University of Insubria, Department of Science and High Technology, Via Valleggio 11, 22100 Como, Italy.
Sci Total Environ. 2022 Aug 20;835:155388. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.155388. Epub 2022 Apr 27.
Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) collect wastewater from various sources and use different treatment processes to reduce the load of pollutants in the environment. Since the removal of many chemical pollutants and bacteria by WWTPs is incomplete, they constitute a potential source of contaminants. The continuous release of contaminants through WWTP effluents can compromise the health of the aquatic ecosystems, even if they occur at very low concentrations. The main objective of this work was to characterize, over a period of four months, the treatment steps starting from income to the effluent and 5 km downstream to the receiving river. In this context, the efficiency removal of chemical pollutants (e.g. hormones and pharmaceuticals, including antibiotics) and bacteria was assessed in a WWTP case study by using a holistic approach. It embraces different chemical and biological-based methods, such as pharmaceutical analysis by HPLC-MSMS, growth rate inhibition in algae, ligand binding estrogen receptor assay, microbial community study by 16S and shotgun sequencing along with relative quantification of resistance genes by quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Although both, chemical and biological-based methods showed a significant reduction of the pollutant burden in effluent and surface waters compared to the influent of the WWTP, no complete removal of pollutants, pathogens and antibiotic resistance genes was observed.
污水处理厂（WWTP）从各种来源收集废水，并采用不同的处理工艺来减少环境中污染物的负荷。由于 WWTP 对许多化学污染物和细菌的去除并不完全，因此它们构成了污染物的潜在来源。即使污染物的浓度非常低，通过 WWTP 废水的持续释放也会危及水生态系统的健康。这项工作的主要目的是在四个月的时间内，对从收入到废水以及 5 公里下游到接收河流的处理步骤进行特征描述。在这种情况下，通过使用整体方法评估了 WWTP 案例研究中化学污染物（例如激素和药物，包括抗生素）和细菌的有效去除。它采用了不同的基于化学和生物学的方法，例如通过 HPLC-MSMS 进行药物分析、藻类生长抑制率、配体结合雌激素受体测定、16S 和 shotgun 测序进行微生物群落研究以及通过定量聚合酶链反应进行抗性基因的相对定量。尽管化学和生物学方法都显示出与 WWTP 进水相比，废水中和地表水中的污染物负荷有明显降低，但没有观察到污染物、病原体和抗生素抗性基因的完全去除。
