This project developed novel sampling tools to allow time integrated passive sampling of existing and emerging chemicals pollutants. Sampling devices developed through this work assisted with more comprehensive and cost-effective monitoring of newly recognised potential toxicants in surface and treated water across Australia.

Honours Thesis completed by Sarit Kaserzon in 2014.

Wastewater, including sewage, must be treated to remove chemical pollutants prior to its release into the environment. Sunlight can degrade polluting contaminants when wastewater is held in large, shallow lagoons. This research will examine the effectiveness of sunlight for reducing pollutants, and how sunlight interacts with substances in water to generate ‘photochemically produced reactive intermediates’, which cause indirect degradation of contaminants. The rate at which light-derived ‘reactive intermediates’ damage selected contaminants, and information about the molecular structure of the contaminants, will be combined to build a conceptual model that can be used to predict future photolysis and contaminant removal in wastewater lagoons.