Proceedings

Although, there is currently in most European countries no legal limit for micropollutants, the removal of these substances from wastewater treatment plant effluent have become into the focus of water authorities. Remaining trace concentrations of such chemicals could lead to negative effects of aquatic flora and fauna. Non-degraded antibiotic in WWTP effluents may also result in formation of antibiotic resistant bacteria strains. Conventional treatment processes of micropollutants are by oxidation (e.g. ozone) and adsorption (e.g. activated carbon). This paper presents an alternative treatment method based on the use of non-thermal plasma as oxidation step. The results show that this technology could reduce pharmaceuticals in real wastewater up to 95%. The main advantages of the process is a comparably less energy demand to conventional oxidations technologies.