Strategies for Selecting Pharmaceuticals to Assess Attenuation During Indirect Potable Water Reuse

During the past decade, it has become apparent that wastewater-derived contaminants such as pharmaceuticals, steroid hormones, detergent metabolites and disinfection by products often are present in surface and groundwater (see Daughton and Ternes 1999; Kummerer 2001; Heberer 2002; Snyder et al. 2003a for reviews). Most of the initial scientific attention related to this topic focused on the potential for certain compounds to interact with the endocrine systems of aquatic organisms (e.g. Desbrow et al. 1998, Routledge et al. 1998, Pickering and Sumpter 2003). More recently, concerns have been raised about the potential for wastewater-derived contaminants to cause other ecological effects, such as the inhibition of primary productivity (Orvos et al. 2002; Wilson et al. 2003) and the alteration of chemical communication (Kolodziej et al. 2003). The presence of pharmaceuticals in drinking water supplies also has raised concerns among water suppliers (Snyder et al. 2003a). In particular, projects that involve intentional indirect potable water reuse have received new scrutiny due to public perception of health threats posed by pharmaceuticals.