Modeling Emerging Pollutants in Waters in the World and China: Pollution Sources and Reduction Strategies

Summary

Anthropogenic activities have driven socio-economic development over the past decades. These activities include intensive agriculture and ongoing urbanization (e.g., cities expand in size and number). As a result, various emerging pollutants may enter rivers and be leached into groundwater. Examples of such pollutants were antibiotics from human excretion and livestock production, herbicides from crop production, plastics, triclosan, and diclofenac from sewage systems. Water pollution with emerging pollutants is of great concern globally and in China, owing to the potential environmental and social impacts. Reducing water pollution is one of the key issues in achieving global environmental sustainability. Large-scale water quality models have been developed and applied to quantify the emerging pollutants in water with source attributions worldwide and in China. However, they were either not complete or specific to sources, areas and pollutants.