Hospital effluents contain a wide spectrum of toxic substances, including medicines and their metabolites, chemicals, heavy metals, disinfectants sterilization agents, radioactive markers, and iodinated contrast agents used for diagnosis, which are generally present at concentrations of g/L. In hospital effluent concentrations of common pharmaceuticals, including antibiotics, analgesics, anti-inflammatory drugs and iodinated contrast agents, are several orders of magnitude higher than in raw urban wastewater. From a treatment perspective, despite their specific contents, hospital wastewaters are quite often considered to be of comparable pollutant nature to urban wastewaters (UWW) and, as such, are discharged directly into public sewers and co-treated with UWWs at the nearest wastewater treatment plant (WWTP). Specific management strategy for hospital effluents is currently the subject of lively debate in the scientific community and the research group from the University of Ferrara Department of Engineering drawn up guidelines for the management and treatment of hospital effluents based on their experience of a purpose-built WWTP designed to treat effluent from a new hospital complex (900 beds) in Ferrara. This plant has been in operation since July 2011 and consists of a multi-barrier system including an advanced biological treatment and advanced oxidation processes to enhance the removal of the different micro-pollutants by biological, chemical and physical means and guarantee good separation between the solid and liquid phases. The treatment employed consists of a full-scale MBR equipped with ultrafiltration membranes, followed by an advanced oxidation step using O3 and UV. This paper brings an overview of a study set out to (i) investigate the occurrence of multi-class pharmaceuticals from different therapeutic groups in the hospital effluents, (ii) to study and compare the efficiency of removal at different stages of treatment and (iii) to assess the potential environmental risk of hospital effluents.
Best strategies for managing and treating hospital effluents. Case study of Ferrara Hospital, Italy
VERLICCHI, Paola;
2014
Abstract
Hospital effluents contain a wide spectrum of toxic substances, including medicines and their metabolites, chemicals, heavy metals, disinfectants sterilization agents, radioactive markers, and iodinated contrast agents used for diagnosis, which are generally present at concentrations of g/L. In hospital effluent concentrations of common pharmaceuticals, including antibiotics, analgesics, anti-inflammatory drugs and iodinated contrast agents, are several orders of magnitude higher than in raw urban wastewater. From a treatment perspective, despite their specific contents, hospital wastewaters are quite often considered to be of comparable pollutant nature to urban wastewaters (UWW) and, as such, are discharged directly into public sewers and co-treated with UWWs at the nearest wastewater treatment plant (WWTP). Specific management strategy for hospital effluents is currently the subject of lively debate in the scientific community and the research group from the University of Ferrara Department of Engineering drawn up guidelines for the management and treatment of hospital effluents based on their experience of a purpose-built WWTP designed to treat effluent from a new hospital complex (900 beds) in Ferrara. This plant has been in operation since July 2011 and consists of a multi-barrier system including an advanced biological treatment and advanced oxidation processes to enhance the removal of the different micro-pollutants by biological, chemical and physical means and guarantee good separation between the solid and liquid phases. The treatment employed consists of a full-scale MBR equipped with ultrafiltration membranes, followed by an advanced oxidation step using O3 and UV. This paper brings an overview of a study set out to (i) investigate the occurrence of multi-class pharmaceuticals from different therapeutic groups in the hospital effluents, (ii) to study and compare the efficiency of removal at different stages of treatment and (iii) to assess the potential environmental risk of hospital effluents.I documenti in SFERA sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
