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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Contents Vol 6(6)

Empirical model for predicting concentrations of refractory hydrophobic organic compounds in digested sludge from municipal wastewater treatment plants

Randhir P. Deo A and Rolf U. Halden A B
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations

A The Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University, Center for Environmental Biotechnology, Tempe, AZ 85287, USA.

B Corresponding author. Email: halden@asu.edu

Environmental Chemistry 6(6) 544-550 https://doi.org/10.1071/EN09063
Submitted: 26 May 2009  Accepted: 29 October 2009   Published: 18 December 2009

Environmental context. Tens of thousands of manmade chemicals are discharged into municipal wastewaters on a continual basis by consumers around the world but surprisingly little is known about the occurrence and fate of these substances in the environment. The present study furnishes an easily applicable model that can help to predict the presence and concentration of manmade chemicals in digested municipal sludge (biosolids) destined for disposal on land. The new tool can be used to prescreen and identify in chemical databases potential environmental pollutants.

Abstract. An empirical model is presented allowing for the prediction of concentrations of hydrophobic organic compounds (HOCs) prone to accumulate and persist in digested sludge (biosolids) generated during conventional municipal wastewater treatment. The sole input requirements of the model are the concentrations of the individual HOCs entering the wastewater treatment plant in raw sewage, the compound’s respective pH-dependent octanol-water partitioning coefficient (DOW), and an empirically determined fitting parameter (pfit) that reflects persistence of compounds in biosolids after accounting for all potential removal mechanisms during wastewater treatment. The accuracy of the model was successfully confirmed at the 99% confidence level in a paired t test that compared predicted concentrations in biosolids to empirical measurements reported in the literature. After successful validation, the resultant model was applied to predict levels of various HOCs for which occurrence data in biosolids thus far are lacking.

Additional keywords: biosolids, emerging contaminants, persistence, sorption.


Acknowledgements

This study was made possible in part by grant 1R01ES015445 of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS). Additional support was provided by the Johns Hopkins University Center for a Livable Future. We thank Kristin McClellan and Jochen Heidler for providing analytical data and valuable input in discussions.


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