Modern approaches to the analysis of disinfection by-products in drinking water

Water, Water Everywhere, but Every Drop Unique: Challenges in the Science to Understand the Role of Contaminants of Emerging Concern in the Management of Drinking Water Supplies

The protection and management of water resources continues to be challenged by multiple and ongoing factors such as shifts in demographic, social, economic, and public health requirements. Physical limitations placed on access to potable supplies include natural and human-caused factors such as aquifer depletion, aging infrastructure, saltwater intrusion, floods, and drought. These factors, although varying in magnitude, spatial extent, and timing, can exacerbate the potential for contaminants of concern (CECs) to be present in sources of drinking water, infrastructure, premise plumbing and associated tap water. This monograph examines how current and emerging scientific efforts and technologies increase our understanding of the range of CECs and drinking water issues facing current and future populations. It is not intended to be read in one sitting, but is instead a starting point for scientists wanting to learn more about the issues surrounding CECs. This text discusses the topical evolution CECs over time (Section 1), improvements in measuring chemical and microbial CECs, through both analysis of concentration and toxicity (Section 2) and modeling CEC exposure and fate (Section 3), forms of treatment effective at removing chemical and microbial CECs (Section 4), and potential for human health impacts from exposure to CECs (Section 5). The paper concludes with how changes to water quantity, both scarcity and surpluses, could affect water quality (Section 6). Taken together, these sections document the past 25 years of CEC research and the regulatory response to these contaminants, the current work to identify and monitor CECs and mitigate exposure, and the challenges facing the future.

Disinfection byproducts potentially responsible for the association between chlorinated drinking water and bladder cancer: A review

Epidemiological studies have consistently associated the consumption of chlorinated drinking water with an enhanced risk of bladder cancer. While this suggests that some disinfection byproducts (DBPs) are bladder carcinogens, causal agents are unknown. This study aims to highlight likely candidates. To achieve this, structures of known and hypothesised DBPs were compared with 76 known bladder carcinogens. The latter are dominated by nitrogenous and aromatic compounds; only 10 are halogenated. Under 10% of the chlorine applied during drinking water treatment is converted into identified halogenated byproducts; most of the chlorine is likely to be consumed during the generation of unidentified non-halogenated oxidation products. Six nitrosamines are among the nine most potent bladder carcinogens, and two of them are known to be DBPs: N-nitrosodiphenylamine and nitrosodibutylamine. However, these and other nitrosamines are formed in insufficiently low concentrations in chlorinated drinking water to account for the observed bladder cancer risk. Furthermore, although not proven bladder carcinogens, certain amines, haloamides, halocyclopentenoic acids, furans and haloquinones are potential candidates. At present, most identified bladder carcinogens are nitrogenous, whereas >90% of natural organic matter is not. Therefore, non-nitrogenous DBPs are likely to contribute to the bladder cancer risk. Given the high proportion of DBPs that remains uncharacterised, it is important that future research prioritises compounds believed to be potent toxicants.

Regulated and emerging disinfection by-products in recycled waters

Disinfection is an integral component of water treatment performed daily on large volumes of water worldwide. Chemical disinfection may result in the unintended production of disinfectant by-products (DBPs) due to reactions between disinfectants and natural organic matter present in the source water. Due to their potential toxicity, levels of DBPs have been strictly regulated in drinking waters for many years. With water reuse now becoming more common around the world DBPs are increasingly becoming a concern in recycled waters, where a much larger amount and variety of compounds may be formed due to a higher abundance and diversity of organic material in the source waters. Regulation of DBPs in recycled waters is limited; generally, drinking water regulations are applied in place of specific guidelines for recycled waters. Such regulations are set for only 11, commonly observed, compounds of the 600+ that may, potentially, be found. In this review an overview of current research in this area is provided, the types of compounds that have been observed, methods for their analysis and possible regulation are also discussed. Through this review it is evident that there is a knowledge gap for the occurrence of DBPs in recycled waters, especially when comparing this information to that available for drinking waters. The concentrations of DBPs observed in recycled waters are seen to be higher than those in drinking water, though still within potable threshold limits. It is clear that there is a need for the analysis and understanding of a larger suite of compounds in recycled waters, as these will most likely be the source of future, global renewable water.

Chloramination of wastewater effluent: Toxicity and formation of disinfection byproducts

The reclamation and disinfection of waters impacted by human activities (e.g., wastewater effluent discharges) are of growing interest for various applications but has been associated with the formation of toxic nitrogenous disinfection byproducts (N-DBPs). Monochloramine used as an alternative disinfectant to chlorine can be an additional source of nitrogen in the formation of N-DBPs. Individual toxicity assays have been performed on many DBPs, but few studies have been conducted with complex mixtures such as wastewater effluents. In this work, we compared the cytotoxicity and genotoxicity of wastewater effluent organic matter (EfOM) before and after chloramination. The toxicity of chloraminated EfOM was significantly higher than the toxicity of raw EfOM, and the more hydrophobic fraction (HPO) isolated on XAD-8 resin was more toxic than the fraction isolated on XAD-4 resin. More DBPs were also isolated on the XAD-8 resin. N-DBPs (i.e., haloacetonitriles or haloacetamides) were responsible for the majority of the cytotoxicity estimated from DBP concentrations measured in the XAD-8 and XAD-4 fractions (99.4% and 78.5%, respectively). Measured DBPs accounted for minor proportions of total brominated and chlorinated products, which means that many unknown halogenated compounds were formed and can be responsible for a significant part of the toxicity. Other non-halogenated byproducts (e.g., nitrosamines) may contribute to the toxicity of chloraminated effluents as well.

Development of quantitative structure activity relationship (QSAR) model for disinfection byproduct (DBP) research: A review of methods and resources

Quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR) models are tools for linking chemical activities with molecular structures and compositions. Due to the concern about the proliferating number of disinfection byproducts (DBPs) in water and the associated financial and technical burden, researchers have recently begun to develop QSAR models to investigate the toxicity, formation, property, and removal of DBPs. However, there are no standard procedures or best practices regarding how to develop QSAR models, which potentially limit their wide acceptance. In order to facilitate more frequent use of QSAR models in future DBP research, this article reviews the processes required for QSAR model development, summarizes recent trends in QSAR-DBP studies, and shares some important resources for QSAR development (e.g., free databases and QSAR programs). The paper follows the four steps of QSAR model development, i.e., data collection, descriptor filtration, algorithm selection, and model validation; and finishes by highlighting several research needs. Because QSAR models may have an important role in progressing our understanding of DBP issues, it is hoped that this paper will encourage their future use for this application.

Occurrence and Comparative Toxicity of Haloacetaldehyde Disinfection Byproducts in Drinking Water

The introduction of drinking water disinfection greatly reduced waterborne diseases. However, the reaction between disinfectants and natural organic matter in the source water leads to an unintended consequence, the formation of drinking water disinfection byproducts (DBPs). The haloacetaldehydes (HALs) are the third largest group by weight of identified DBPs in drinking water. The primary objective of this study was to analyze the occurrence and comparative toxicity of the emerging HAL DBPs. A new HAL DBP, iodoacetaldehyde (IAL) was identified. This study provided the first systematic, quantitative comparison of HAL toxicity in Chinese hamster ovary cells. The rank order of HAL cytotoxicity is tribromoacetaldehyde (TBAL) ≈ chloroacetaldehyde (CAL) > dibromoacetaldehyde (DBAL) ≈ bromochloroacetaldehyde (BCAL) ≈ dibromochloroacetaldehyde (DBCAL) > IAL > bromoacetaldehyde (BAL) ≈ bromodichloroacetaldehyde (BDCAL) > dichloroacetaldehyde (DCAL) > trichloroacetaldehyde (TCAL). The HALs were highly cytotoxic compared to other DBP chemical classes. The rank order of HAL genotoxicity is DBAL > CAL ≈ DBCAL > TBAL ≈ BAL > BDCAL>BCAL ≈ DCAL>IAL. TCAL was not genotoxic. Because of their toxicity and abundance, further research is needed to investigate their mode of action to protect the public health and the environment.

Simultaneous assessments of occurrence, ecological, human health, and organoleptic hazards for 77 VOCs in typical drinking water sources from 5 major river basins, China

Owing to the growing public awareness on the safety and aesthetics in water sources, more attention has been given to the adverse effects of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) on aquatic organisms and human beings. In this study, 77 target VOCs (including 54 common VOCs, 13 carbonyl compounds, and 10 taste and odor compounds) were detected in typical drinking water sources from 5 major river basins (the Yangtze, the Huaihe, the Yellow, the Haihe and the Liaohe River basins) and their occurrences were characterized. The ecological, human health, and olfactory assessments were performed to assess the major hazards in source water. The investigation showed that there existed potential ecological risks (1.30 × 10 ≤ RQtotals ≤ 8.99 × 10) but little human health risks (6.84 × 10(-7) ≤ RQtotals ≤ 4.24 × 10(-4)) by VOCs, while that odor problems occurred extensively. The priority contaminants in drinking water sources of China were also listed based on the present assessment criteria.

Disparity in disinfection byproducts concentration between hot and cold tap water

The quality of water entering a distribution system may differ substantially from the quality at the point of exposure to the consumer. This study investigated temporal variations in the levels of regulated and non-regulated disinfection byproducts (DBPs) in cold and hot tap water in a home on a medium-sized municipal water system. In addition, samples were collected directly from the water plant with some being held in accordance with a simulated distribution system (SDS) test protocol. The location for this work was a system in western Massachusetts, USA that uses free chlorine as a final disinfectant. Very little short term variability of DBPs at the point of entry (POE) was observed. The concentration of DBPs in the time-variable SDS test was similar to concentrations in the cold water tap. For most DBPs, the concentrations continued to increase as the cold water tap sample was held for the time-variable SDS incubation period. However, the impact of heating on DBP levels was compound specific. For example, the concentrations of trihalomethanes (THMs), dichloroacetic acid (DCAA) and chloropicrin (CP) were substantially higher in the hot water tap than in the cold water time-variable SDS samples. In contrast, the concentration of trichloroacetic acid (TCAA) was lower in the heated hot tap water, but about equal to that observed in the cold tap water. The situation was more pronounced for dichloroacetonitrile (DCAN), bromodichloroacetic acid (BDCAA), bromochloroacetic acid (BCAA) and 1,1,1-trichloropropanone (TCP), which all showed lower concentrations in the hot water then in either of the cold water samples (instantaneous or time-variable SDS). The latter was viewed as a clear indication of thermally-induced decomposition. The ratio of unknown total organic halide (UTOX) to TOX was substantially lower in the hot tap water as the THM to TOX ratio became correspondingly larger. The results of this study show that DBP exposure in the home is not well represented by concentrations measured in cold water taps where most compliance monitoring is done.