Review of 'emerging' organic contaminants in biosolids and assessment of international research priorities for the agricultural use of biosolids.

By B. Clarke, Stephen R. Smith. Environment International, 2011

787 citations recorded by the source corpus.

A broad spectrum of organic chemicals is essential to modern society. Once discharged from industrial, domestic and urban sources into the urban wastewater collection system they may transfer to the residual solids during wastewater treatment and assessment of their significance and implications for beneficial recycling of the treated sewage sludge biosolids is required. Research on organic contaminants (OCs) in biosolids has been undertaken for over thirty years and the increasing body of evidence demonstrates that the majority of compounds studied do not place human health at risk when biosolids are recycled to farmland. However, there are 143,000 chemicals registered in the European Union for industrial use and all could be potentially found in biosolids. Therefore, a literature review of 'emerging' OCs in biosolids has been conducted for a selection of chemicals of potential concern for land application based upon human toxicity, evidence of adverse effects on the environment and endocrine disruption. To identify monitoring and research priorities the selected chemicals were ranked using an assessment matrix approach. Compounds were evaluated based upon environmental persistence, human toxicity, evidence of bioaccumulation in humans and the environment, evidence of ecotoxicity and the number and quality of studies focussed on the contaminant internationally. The identified chemicals of concern were ranked in decreasing order of priority: perfluorinated chemicals (PFOS, PFOA); polychlorinated alkanes (PCAs), polychlorinated naphthalenes (PCNs); organotins (OTs), polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), triclosan (TCS), triclocarban (TCC); benzothiazoles; antibiotics and pharmaceuticals; synthetic musks; bisphenol A, quaternary ammonium compounds (QACs), steroids; phthalate acid esters (PAEs) and polydimethylsiloxanes (PDMSs). A number of issues were identified and recommendations for the prioritisation of further research and monitoring of 'emerging' OCs for the agricultural use of biosolids are provided. In particular, a number of 'emerging' OCs (PFOS, PFOA and PCAs) were identified for priority attention that are environmentally persistent and potentially toxic with unique chemical properties, or are present in large concentrations in sludge, that make it theoretically possible for them to enter human and ecological food-chains from biosolids-amended soil.

Subfields: Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis, Pollution

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/3b7b2f241ac38ef5f262760cb55bf93328a30739

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Citations in the corpus

Potential Benefits and Risks for Soil Health Derived From the Use of Organic Amendments in Agriculture (2019, background): “Therefore, there is an urgent need to determine the potential ecotoxicity of those organic pollutants present in organic amendments, in order to ensure the long-term sustainability and safety of this agronomic practice [150].”
Heavy metals in food crops: Health risks, fate, mechanisms, and management. (2019, background): “Therefore, the diverse and emerging issues of food security have become a global concern, particularly their inextricable association with human health (Clarke, 2011; Säumel et al., 2012; Toth et al., 2016; Rai, 2018a).”
Fluorinated alternatives to long-chain perfluoroalkyl carboxylic acids (PFCAs), perfluoroalkane sulfonic acids (PFSAs) and their potential precursors. (2013, background): “…persistent (Frömel and Knepper, 2010; Parsons et al., 2008), bioaccumulative (Conder et al., 2008) and have been detected ubiquitously in the abiotic environment (Rayne and Forest, 2009), biota (Giesy et al., 2001), food items (Clarke and Smith, 2011) and humans (Vestergren and Cousins, 2009).”
Emerging organic contaminants in groundwater: A review of sources, fate and occurrence. (2012, background): “…in waste water related bio-solids and their relatively high solubility two types of halogenated hydrocarbons (perflurochemicals and polychlorinated alkanes) are considered important potential groundwater contaminants from applications to soil and surface runoff (Clarke and Smith., 2011).”
Tetracycline degradation in aquatic environment by highly porous MnO2 nanosheet assembly (2015, background): “As a consequence, it is now included in the group of “emerging organic contaminants” [3].”
Uptake, accumulation and metabolism of PFASs in plants and health perspectives: A critical review (2020, background): “In Clarke and Smith (2011), biosolids were found to contain 196 mg/kg dw of PFOS and 75 mg/kg dw of PFOA.”
Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), an emerging drinking water contaminant: a critical review of recent literature. (2012, background): “, 2012), land application of biosolids (sludge) (Clarke and Smith, 2011; Lindstrom et al., 2011b; Sepulvado et al., 2011), land application of wastewater from industrial sources (Konwick et al.”
Microplastics as an emerging threat to terrestrial ecosystems (2018, background): “Phthalates, bisphenol, and many other plastic additives have been found at moderately high levels in potentially microplastic-rich sludge from water treatments used for agricultural purposes (Clarke & Smith, 2011).”
Review of Antimicrobial Resistance in the Environment and Its Relevance to Environmental Regulators (2016, background): “The antibiotics that are more frequently found in sludge are those that are generally less water soluble, e.g., norfloxacin, ofloxacin, ciprofloxacin, trimethoprim, sulfamethoxazole, and doxycycline (McClellan and Halden, 2010; Clarke and Smith, 2011).”