Abstract
Industrial development has made new products available to people to make their lives easier. Items such as food, cleaning, personal care and health products, among others, are processed, sold and consumed daily by all age groups. These products include in their formulation inorganic and organic chemicals with the purpose of improving or increasing some of their properties, making them more attractive to the consumer. These substances are strictly controlled during production so that the final product may be safely consumed. In most cases, the constituents of commercial products end up in wastewater, where they are not controlled. These uncontrolled pollutants of differing chemical natures are known as “Emerging Contaminants” (ECs). Research worldwide has found ECs in various environmental matrices, especially water. To understand this problem, four fundamental aspects must be addressed: 1) the analytical methods for its determination; 2) the occurrence in environmental matrices; 3) the treatments for the removal of ECs in wastewater and drinking water plants; and 4) the risks to health and the environment. This document reviews these four aspects with regard to 14 ECs commonly found in the studies around the world and addresses the state of these ECs in trans-American waters.
Highlights
Human population increase has inevitably entailed the greater production of wastewater
Regarding the efficiency of the removal of the Emerging Contaminants” (ECs), a Canadian study on a WWTP that included UV disinfection found diclofenac in the affluent and effluent; the results show that around 19% diclofenac was eliminated in the first process with gravel and sand; from the rest, 34% was eliminated in the primary clarifier, 30% of the rest was eliminated in the second clarifier and the remaining 35% was removed in UV disinfection
Emerging contaminants found in the waters of the American continent include a wide range of polar- and non-polar organic compounds
Summary
Human population increase has inevitably entailed the greater production of wastewater. The American continent was chosen because it includes countries with different Human Development Indices (HDIs) (PNUD, 2016; 2018); while the United States and Canada enjoy high HDIs, and have robust systems for the control of water quality and sanitation as well as important infrastructure for research in analytical chemistry and engineering, among others, most of Latin America and the Caribbean lack policies for the care of water and/or wastewater treatment facilities, and in some cases, even for drinking water It is considered one of the geographic areas most susceptible to higher levels of pollutants in aquatic biota (Llorca et al, 2016)
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