Hydrology: Current Research

Emerging Contaminants - Small Concentrations, Big Problems

Abstract

Satinder K. Brar

For the last decade, we have seen an upsurge in the scientific documentation of emerging contaminants which comprises several chemical and microbial constituents that have not traditionally been considered as contaminants and are present in the environment on a global scale. Emerging contaminants can originate from a variety of animal- and human-waste sources, including municipal, agricultural, and industrial wastewater pathways. The emerging contaminants comprise, nanoparticles, endocrine disrupter compounds, pharmaceuticals and personal care products, prions, cyanobacteria, plasticizers, organometallic compounds, among others. The trail to the environment can be from rapid and direct discharges of effluent into a water body or the slow leaching of stored waste through soils. These emerging contaminants represent a shift in traditional thinking, as many are produced industrially yet are dispersed to the environment from domestic, commercial, and industrial uses. The emerging contaminants present the biggest challenge of analysis as some of them are present in nanograms or pictograms and in fact, these environmentally relevant concentrations lend toxicity.