Risk Assessment of Phthalate Esters in Baiyangdian Lake and Typical Rivers in China

Abstract

Phthalate esters (PAEs) are frequently tracked in water environments worldwide. As a typical class of endocrine disruptor chemicals (EDCs), PAEs posed adverse effects on aquatic organisms at low concentration. Thus, they have attracted wide attention in recent years. In the present study, the concentrations of seven typical PAEs from 30 sampling sites in Baiyangdian Lake were measured, and the environmental exposure data of PAEs were gathered in typical rivers in China. Then, based on the aquatic life criteria (ALCs) derived from the reproductive toxicity data of aquatic organisms, two risk assessment methods, including hazard quotient (HQ) and probabilistic ecological risk assessment (PERA), were adopted to evaluate the ecological risks of PAEs in water. The sediment quality criteria (SQCs) of DEHP, DBP, BBP, DIBP and DEP were deduced based on the equilibrium partitioning method. Combined with the gathered environmental exposure data of seven PAEs in sediments from typical rivers in China, the ecological risk assessments of five PAEs in sediment were conducted only by the HQ method. The results of ecological risk assessment showed that in terms of water, DBP and DIBP posed low risk, while the risk of DEHP in Baiyangdian Lake cannot be ignored and should receive attention. In typical rivers in China, BBP and DEP posed no risk, while DIBP and DBP posed potential risk. Meanwhile, DEHP posed a high ecological risk. As far as sediment is concerned, DBP posed a high risk in some typical rivers in China, and the other rivers had medium risk. DEHP posed a high risk only in a few rivers and low to medium risk in others. This study provides an important reference for the protection of aquatic organisms and the risk management of PAEs in China.

Contaminant occurrence, distribution and ecological risk assessment of phthalate esters in the Persian Gulf

“…Hou and colleagues collected the water samples from five functional areas of Baiyangdian including the primitive area, tourism area, living area, breeding area, and inflow area, and analyzed for concentrations of PAEs. The order of detected ∑PAEs concentration in studied areas was as: inflow area->aquaculture, living areas, and tourist areas>primitive area, and higher concentrations are related to the influence of industrial sewage, human activities, and pesticides and fertilizers usage [50]. Wang and his colleagues found that the risk assessment of seawater indicated that DEHP and DiBP may pose potential high risks for sensitive organisms, and DnBP may indicate moderate ecological risks [51].…”

Environmental Risk Assessment of the Harbin Section of the Songhua River Basin Based on Multi-Source Data Fusion

“…Yang [19] conducted an ecological risk assessment of semi-arid watersheds based on the risk response conceptual model and improved the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) model. Hou [20] evaluated the environmental risk of Phthalic Acid Esters (PAEs) in water using two risk assessment methods, Hazard Quotient (HQ) and Probabilistic Ecological Risk Assessment (PERA), based on Aquatic Life Criteria (ALCs) derived from aquatic organism reproductive toxicity data.…”

“…model. Hou [20] evaluated the environmental risk of Phthalic Acid Esters (PAEs) in water using two risk assessment methods, Hazard Quotient (HQ) and Probabilistic Ecological Risk Assessment (PERA), based on Aquatic Life Criteria (ALCs) derived from aquatic organism reproductive toxicity data.…”