IWRA Proceedings

AbstractAn integrated approach for the management of pharmaceutical products in environmental waters Clémence COETSIER, Liming LIN, Benoît ROIG and Evelyne TOURAUD Ecole des Mines d’Alès-LGEI, 6 avenue de Clavières, 30319 Alès Cedex Corresponding author: Clemence.Coetsier@ema.fr At a time when water resources become impoverished, it becomes necessary to keep water supplies under surveillance and to preserve them from any contamination due to either known pollutants (priority substances listed in the Water Framework Directive) or emerging ones. Pharmaceuticals products (PPs) are emerging pollutants of interest as they can be still biologically active in waterways and could impact aquatic ecosystems. They actually contaminate surface and groundwater through direct runoff or discharge of treated sewage where they are not completely eliminated. Moreover, some compounds have been found in drinking water. An integrated approach which considers the whole life-cycle of PPs is proposed to identify the main pressure points and then to propose actions enable to reduce their occurrence and their impact on the aquatic environment. For this purpose, an environmental typology of PPs is developed according to different criteria (treatment plant characteristics, amount of treated wastewater per inhabitant and per day, origin of the sewage, …) and draw a state of occurrence of PPs toward these criteria. In this frame, sampling campaigns have been carried out and PPs have been analyzed by LC-MS/MS. In parallel, several additional treatments (photo-oxidation, adsorption) are tested for the elimination of PPs residues in environmental waters. All the data will be inter-connected and results will be scrutinized in order to propose actions for lowering occurrence and the impact of pharmaceuticals in water supplies. This work is in support for KNAPPE (Knowledge Assessment of Pharmaceutical Products in Environmental waters) project, funded by European Commission (Specific Support Action - contract n° 036864). Keywords: pharmaceutical products, integrated approach, environmental typology, water management