Health Risk Assessment for Reused Backwash Water from Saveh Water Treatment Plant

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Department of Environmental Health Engineering, Saveh University of Medical Sciences, Saveh, Iran

2 School of Public Health and Institute of Public Health Research, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

3 Head of Water Technical Studies &Reviews Office, Markazi Province Water and Wastewater Company, Arak, Iran

4 Administration Manager of the Saveh Water Treatment Plant, Saveh Water and WasteWater Company, Saveh, Iran

5 Deputy of Human Resources and Research, Markazi Province Water and Wastewater Company, Arak, Iran

6 Management of Research and Management Development, Markazi Province Water and Wastewater Company, Arak, Iran

7 Research Expert, Markazi Province Water and Wastewater Company, Arak, Iran

10.34172/jaehr.1329

Abstract

Background: The increase in population growth, industries and living standards have caused an increasing need for drinking water in many countries. The reuse of treated water and wastewater is one of the most important options to deal with water shortage. To ensure the correctness of this work, it is necessary that the health risk assessment be reassessed during use so that consumers do not face serious problems. In this regard, the assessment of health risks assessment for the water recovered from the backwashing wastewater of the Saveh water treatment plant was investigated.
Methods: To reuse the backwash wastewater from the Saveh water treatment plant, the processes of primary sedimentation and coagulation (in the form of a test jar) were investigated. Metals and heavy metals like iron (Fe), aluminum (Al), lead (Pb), Arsenic (As) and cadmium (Cd) were examined to evaluate health risks. The initial settling time was 1 hour, the coagulant used was FeCl3 made in Iran, and heavy metal contents were also measured with an Inductively coupled plasma (ICP) device.
Results: The value of HRIs for Al, Fe, As, Pb and Cd in the treated spent filter backwash water (SFBW) with primary sedimentation and coagulation was less than “1” and indicates the absence of risk.
Conclusion: The treated backwash wastewater treated with primary sedimentation and coagulation processes as well as raw water of the Saveh have no harmful effects in terms of heavy metals, and its reuse will not pose a risk to the health of the consumer. 

Keywords

Main Subjects


  1. Ebrahimi A, Amin MM, Hajizadeh Y, Pourzamani H, Memarzadeh M, Mahvi AH, et al. Filter backwash water treatment by coagulation: a comparison study by polyaluminium ferric chloride and ferric chloride. Desalin Water Treat. 2017;66:320-9.
  2. Asano T, Burton F, Leverenz H, Tsuchihashi R. Water Reuse: Issues, Technologies, and Applications. McGraw-Hill Education; 2007.
  3. Reißmann FG, Schulze E, Albrecht V. Application of a combined UF/RO system for the reuse of filter backwash water from treated swimming pool water. Desalination. 2005;178(1- 3):41-9. doi: 1016/j.desal.2004.11.027.
  4. Sukanya K, Sivarajasekar N, Saranya K. Spent filter backwash water treatment by coagulation followed by ultrafiltration. In: Karchiyappan T, Karri RR, Dehghani MH, eds. Industrial Wastewater Treatment: Emerging Technologies for Sustainability. Cham: Springer; 2022. p. 27-40. doi: 1007/978-3-030-98202-7_2.
  5. Huang C, Lin JL, Lee WS, Pan JR, Zhao B. Effect of coagulation mechanism on membrane permeability in coagulation-assisted microfiltration for spent filter backwash water recycling. Colloids Surf A Physicochem Eng Asp. 2011;378(1-3):72-8. doi: 1016/j.colsurfa.2011.01.054.
  6. Yang CB, Cheng YL, Liu JC, Lee DJ. Treatment and reuse of backwash water in Taipei water treatment plant, Taiwan. Water Sci Technol Water Supply. 2006;6(6):89-98. doi: 2166/ws.2006.961.
  7. Aghaei F, Jalilzadeh Yengejeh R. Investigation of effective parameters on the performance of NF membrane in simultaneous removal of Cr(VI) and Cu from contaminated water. Pollution. 2017;3(3):383-94. doi: 7508/ pj.2017.03.004.
  8. Ebrahimi A, Amin MM, Pourzamani H, Hajizadeh Y, Mahvi AH, Mahdavi M, et al. Hybrid coagulation-UF processes for spent filter backwash water treatment: a comparison studies for PAFCl and FeCl3 as a pre-treatment. Environ Monit Assess. 2017;189(8):387. doi: 1007/s10661-017-6091-3.
  9. Gerhardsson L. Diagnosis and treatment of metal poisoning general aspects. In: Nordberg GF, Costa M, eds. Handbook on the Toxicology of Metals. 5th ed. Academic Press; 2022. p. 663-84. doi: 1016/b978-0-12-823292-7.00017-6.
  10. Pourret O, Hursthouse A. It’s time to replace the term “heavy metals” with “potentially toxic elements” when reporting environmental research. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2019;16(22):4446. doi: 3390/ijerph16224446.
  11. Roomiani L, Jalilzadeh Yengejeh R. Study the potential uptake of heavy metals by aquatic plants in Dez River. Iran J Ecohydrol. 2016;3(1):133-40. doi: 22059/ije.2016.59196.
  12. Babaei AA, Ghanbari F, Jalilzadeh Yengejeh R. Simultaneous use of iron and copper anodes in photoelectro-Fenton process: concurrent removals of dye and cadmium. Water Sci Technol. 2017;75(7):1732-42. doi: 2166/wst.2017.049.
  13. Mahdavi M, Amin MM, Hajizadeh Y, Farrokhzadeh H, Ebrahimi A. Removal of different NOM fractions from spent filter backwash water by polyaluminum ferric chloride and ferric chloride. Arab J Sci Eng. 2017;42(4):1497-504. doi: 1007/s13369-016-2364-3.
  14. Mahvi AH, Jafari A. Influence of spent filter backwash water (SFBW) recycling on coagulants reduction in Jalalieh water treatment plant. Feyz. 2005;9(2):33-7. [Persian].
  15. Skolubovich Y, Voytov E, Skolubovich A, Ilyina L. Cleaning and reusing backwash water of water treatment plants. IOP Conf Ser Earth Environ Sci. 2017;90(1):012035. doi: 1088/1755-1315/90/1/012035.
  16. Ebrahimi A, Mahdavi M, Pirsaheb M, Alimohammadi F, Mahvi AH. Dataset on the cost estimation for spent filter backwash water (SFBW) treatment. Data Brief. 2017;15:1043-7. doi: 1016/j.dib.2017.10.040.
  17. Mahdavi M, Ebrahimi A, Azarpira H, Tashauoei HR, Mahvi AH. Dataset on the spent filter backwash water treatment by sedimentation, coagulation and ultra filtration. Data Brief. 2017;15:916-21. doi: 1016/j.dib.2017.10.062.
  18. Alidadi H, Tavakoly Sany SB, Zarif Garaati Oftadeh B, Mohamad T, Shamszade H, Fakhari M. Health risk assessments of arsenic and toxic heavy metal exposure in drinking water in northeast Iran. Environ Health Prev Med. 2019;24(1):59. doi: 1186/s12199-019-0812-x.
  19. Mohammadi AA, Zarei A, Majidi S, Ghaderpoury A, Hashempour Y, Saghi MH, et al. Carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic health risk assessment of heavy metals in drinking water of Khorramabad, Iran. MethodsX. 2019;6:1642-51. doi: 1016/j.mex.2019.07.017.
  20. Mohammadpour A, Emadi Z, Samaei MR, Ravindra K, Hosseini SM, Amin M, et al. The concentration of potentially toxic elements (PTEs) in drinking water from Shiraz, Iran: a health risk assessment of samples. Environ Sci Pollut Res. 2023;30(9):23295-311. doi: 1007/s11356-022-23535-2.
  21. Cantoni B, Penserini L, Vries D, Dingemans MML, Bokkers BGH, Turolla A, et al. Development of a quantitative chemical risk assessment (QCRA) procedure for contaminants of emerging concern in drinking water supply. Water Res. 2021;194:116911. doi: 1016/j.watres.2021.116911.
  22. Nativio A, Kapelan Z, van der Hoek JP. Risk assessment methods for water resource recovery for the production of bio-composite materials: literature review and future research directions. Environ Chall (Amst). 2022;9:100645. doi: 1016/j.envc.2022.100645.
  23. Joint FA. JECFA. Reports of the 53rd meeting of the joint FAO/ WHO expert committee on food additives (JECFA). JECFA/53/ TRS. Rome, Italy; 1999.
  24. Mahdavi M, Amin MM, Mahvi AH, Pourzamani H, Ebrahimi A. Metals, heavy metals and microorganism removal from spent filter backwash water by hybrid coagulation-UF processes. J Water Reuse Desalin. 2017;8(2):225-33. doi: 2166/ wrd.2017.148.
  25. Khan S, Cao Q, Zheng YM, Huang YZ, Zhu YG. Health risks of heavy metals in contaminated soils and food crops irrigated with wastewater in Beijing, China. Environ Pollut. 2008;152(3):686-92. doi: 1016/j.envpol.2007.06.056.
  26. Sadeghi M, Noroozi M. Carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic risk assessment of heavy metals in water resources of north east of Iran in 2018. J Environ Health Sustain Dev. 2021;6(2):1321- 9. doi: 18502/jehsd.v6i2.6543.