Doesn’t wastewater treatment remove EDCs?
Federal regulations require us to remove 85 percent of solid materials from wastewater before we discharge the treated effluent into natural water bodies. Regulations also require our wastewater discharges to meet state water-quality standards, but there are no waterquality standards for some of these compounds. While standards are available for some compounds (PCBs, some pesticides), the standards were not based on impacts to the endocrine system. King County’s treatment plants in Seattle and Renton use a two-stage process called conventional secondary treatment that typically removes 95 percent of the solids; however, this process does not remove all contaminants or EDCs. Membrane bioreactor technologies, an advanced wastewater treatment process, are proving capable of removing a larger amount of solid materials from wastewater than conventional secondary treatment. For example, the membrane bioreactor technology to be used at the Brightwater and Carnation wastewater treatment plants
