Title: Girly Grass
1Girly Grass Dana Devin-Clarke. Sally Brown,
Michael Muramoto, and Michael Doubrava Universit
y of Washington and King County Environmental
Laboratory
Methods of Extraction
Study Design
Background
- The leachate is collected and transferred to King
County for extraction and analysis. - Ibuprofen and Triclosan
- Liquid/ Liquid extraction
- Concentration on Turbovap
- Analysis on GC/MS
- The Estrogens
- ZHE Filtration
- Vacuum Degassing
- C-18 SPE loading
- NH2 Cleanup
- Silica Cleanup
- Alumina Cleanup
- Derivatizing the Extracts
- Analysis on the GC/MS
- The soil extraction and analysis methods are
currently being researched.
Many pharmaceuticals and personal care products
or PCPPs enter and leave wastewater treatment
plants (WWTP) unaltered or incompletely removed
and are subsequently released into the
environment through wastewater outflows. Fish
exposed to PPCPs in wastewater outflows have been
shown to exhibit intersex characteristics.
Instead of releasing effluent into streams,
wastewater can be further treated and
beneficially reused for irrigation of golf
courses, farmland or forestry plantations.
However, the persistence of PCPPs once applied to
a soil system, such as a golf course, is yet to
be researched. Subsequently, this study was
created to assess the benefits and potential for
exposure to PCPPs by using reclaimed water
produced by Renton Treatment Plant to grow turf
grass from the Foster Links Golf Course in
Tukwila. The PCPPs that will be monitored for
mobility as well as presence in the soils
include ibuprofen, triclosan and the natural and
synthetic estrogens estriol, 17ß-estradiol and
ethinylestradiol
6 X 6 squares of Fairway and Tee turf grass
were transplanted from the Foster Links Golf
Course to pots in the CUH greenhouse.
- These grasses were then assigned one of five
treatments including - T1 Control (Tap water 100Fert)
- T2 Reclaimed water (RW) only
- T3 RW 50 Fertilizer
- T4 RW 100 Fertilizer
- T5 Biosolids (Tap water only)
- Each pot is watered with 500 mL of water and
received fertilizer amendments of 50 and 100
actual course application rates
Compounds of Interest
Preliminary Conclusions
Samples Estrone (E1) Estradiol (E2) Ethinylestradiol (EE2)
Reclaimed Water (source) 130 ng/ 500 mL 18 ng/ 500 mL 15 ng/ 500 mL
Control Leachate ND ND ND
Fairway Leachate lt MDL lt MDL ND
Tee Leachate 30 lt MDL ND
Biosolids Leachate lt MDL ND lt MDL
Ibuprofen an anti-inflammatory drug -
Concentrations as low as 1 µg/L affect the
heat shock response in trout fry -USGS stream
surveys in thirty states revealed a detected
stream concentrations Median 0.20 µg/L Max
1.0 µg/L Triclosan anti-microbial compound in
household products - Lethal conc. (LC50 rainbow
trout 0.35 µg/L) - The degradation
byproducts methyl-TCS, which bioaccumulates
in fish and dioxin, a known carcinogen -Strea
m conc Median(0.80 ?g/L) and Max. (40
?g/L) Natural and Synthetic estrogens -Fish
exposed to concentrations as low as 1 ng/L
begin to develop intersex characteristics -St
ream conc. a median and maximum 0.073 and
0.831 µg/L for ethinylestradiol (EE2) 0.009
and 0.2 µg/L for estradiol (E2) 0.027 and
0.112 µg/L for estrone (E1)
- The source water and leachate is collected every
other week and tested at the King County
Environmental Laboratory. - These are tested to determine
- the total concentration of compounds being
loaded into the system - the amount of compound that may potentially pass
through the system in the leachate - The soil and plant samples will be collected and
tested at the end of the study to determine
plant uptake as well as potential accumulation or
persistence of compounds in a sediment system.
- ND Not Detected, lt MDL less than methods
detection limit - Note these are the preliminary numbers from
the first extraction. More data is required to
fully characterize the fate and concentration of
compounds within this system - Initial results indicate
- The estrogens, added with the reclaimed water,
do not pass through the soil system.