Analytical method to monitor contaminants of emerging concern in water and soil samples from a non-conventional wastewater treatment system

Huidobro, B. and López-Heras, I. and Alonso-Alonso, C. and Martínez-Hernández, V. and Nozal, L. and De Bustamante, I. (2022) Analytical method to monitor contaminants of emerging concern in water and soil samples from a non-conventional wastewater treatment system. Journal of Chromatography A, 1671. p. 463006. ISSN 00219673

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Abstract

Nonconventional wastewater treatments, such as vegetation filters (VFs), are propitious systems to atten- uate contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) in small municipalities. The development of standardised multiresidue and multimatrix methods suitable for measuring a reliable number of CEC in environmental samples is crucial for monitoring infiltrating concentrations and for ensuring these systems’ treatment capacity. The objective of this study is to develop and validate an analytical method for the simultaneous determination of CECs, including transformation products (TPs), with diverse physico-chemical proper- ties, in environmental samples. The optimised method is based on sample clean-up and preconcentration by solid-phase extraction (SPE), followed by liquid chromatography electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). The method is able to detect and quantify 40 target CECs, including pharma- ceuticals of different classes (analgesics, antibiotics, antihypertensives, lipid regulators, anticonvulsants, antidepressants, antiarrhythmics, beta-blockers, amongst others), hormones and lifestyle products with good reproducibility (variations below 23%), in different water matrices, and 28 CECs, in soil samples. Ac- ceptable recoveries (65–120%) were obtained for most of the CECs in all the matrices. However in the soil samples, as complexity required a prior extraction treatment, the recovery of some analytes was affected, which reduced the number of target CECs. The achieved methodological quantification limits (0.05–5 ng/L and 0.04–1.1 ng/g levels for the water and the soil matrices, respectively) were reasonably low for most CECs. The proposed method was successfully applied to monitor CECs in a VF. The CECs detected at higher concentrations are some of the world’s most widely used products (e.g. acetaminophen or caffeine and its main TP, paraxanthine). The results showed an almost 70% reduction in CEC concentrations during in- filtration. The groundwater data indicated that the VF treatment operation did not affect the underlying aquifer (Cmax found in GW < 1 μg/L).

Item Type:	Article
Subjects:	Q Science > QS Ecology Q Science > QD Chemistry T Technology > TD Environmental technology. Sanitary engineering
Depositing User:	Blanca Huidobro López
Date Deposited:	03 May 2022 15:27
Last Modified:	19 May 2022 07:05
URI:	http://eprints.imdea-agua.org:13000/id/eprint/1364

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