Fate of veterinary antibiotics in riverine soils: evaluation of applicability in riverbank filtration

Abstract

Riverbank filtration, which is an induced bank infiltration method in managed aquifer recharge, is an eco-friendly and economical water treatment method to remove the diverse contaminants in water. One of the primary water environmental concerns today is related to the removal of organic micropollutants, such as veterinary antibiotics (VAs). In this study, we performed batch-scale and column experiments using diverse regional areas of soils and pretreated soils (natural, sterilized, and baked soils) in order to identify the removal mechanisms of the three representative soil VAs. Results from the experiments showed that tetracycline and erythromycin were removed in soils by sorption with an electric attractive force between soil particles and compounds, regardless of soil properties. Sulfathiazole was influenced by microbial activities and sorption with soil organic matter. This study shows that the fate of representative VAs in soil and riverbank/bed filtration system is effective treatment method to remove VAs. © 2015 Balaban Desalination Publications. All rights reserved.