Urban wastewater treatment plants are important sinks and sources of emerging contaminants, which are a crucial barrier to interrupt its discharge into the aquatic environment. To provide ideas for the prevention and control of emerging contaminants in urban wastewater treatment plants and help achieve the construction of a healthy China, this paper focuses on the categories of emerging contaminants in urban wastewater. We argue that the concentrations of emerging contaminants in wastewater from different districts show significant geographical characteristics, which are closely related to regional environmental conditions, population density, wastewater sources, socio-economic conditions and industrial layout. We analyze the migration and transformation patterns of emerging contaminants in various units of urban wastewater treatment plants. The results indicate that removal of emerging contaminants from wastewater treatment plants is influenced by critical factors including wastewater treatment processes and emerging contaminants categories. We also illustrate that removal of emerging contaminants from urban wastewater treatment plants is currently challenged by the lack of regulations and standards, outdated monitoring technologies, hard-to-construct risk assessment systems, and ineffective removal technologies. We propose appropriate prevention and control strategies to address these challenges.

urban sewage treatment plants  /  emerging contaminants  /  occurrence characteristics  /  pollutant removal technology