Fate and Potential Effect of Emerging Contaminants: Extending Knowledge and Mitigation Strategies

The widespread occurrence in watersheds of emerging contaminants, including pharmaceutical and personal care products (PPCPs) and steroid hormones, has been recognized as a critical environmental issue. Effluents from municipal sewage treatment plants (STPs) and wastewater from concentrated animal feed operations (CAFOs) are major sources of these contaminants. Results from an ongoing project supported by the University of Illinois Extension will be presented. This project uses research, education, and outreach components to address PPCP and hormone issues, including public awareness and mitigation strategies. In this project, we developed robust analytical methods to monitor the occurrence of emerging contaminants in STP effluent, CAFO wastewater, and the receiving watersheds. The degradation and transport processes of emerging contaminants in water‐soil systems were investigated as well as their potential uptake and accumulation in plants. A medicine take‐back program and an oil‐sequester water treatment were used as mitigation strategies to reduce PPCP and hormone contamination.