Upcoming Environmental Conference

Biologists testing water of natural river

Rising concerns among environmental scientists over a multitude of contaminants found in water and aquatic life and their impact on human health have prompted ISTC to partner with the Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant to host an upcoming conference titled, “Emerging Contaminants in the Aquatic Environment.” The two-day conference will be packed with many experts, including four keynote presentations by researchers from the U.S.EPA, Loyola University Chicago, USGS, and the National Sea Grant Law Center. The oral presentations will cover a variety of viewpoints, namely research, policy, and education & outreach.

 

Contaminants of emerging concern, as defined by the USGS, are

“…any synthetic or naturally occurring chemical or any microorganism that is not commonly monitored in the environment but has the potential to enter the environment and cause known or suspected adverse ecological and (or) human health effects.”

 

In some cases, a contaminant could have been entering the environment for decades or centuries but only recently has been detected or environmental impacts been attributed to that compound. Some of the contaminants that will be discussed at the conference include pharmaceuticals, over-the-counter medicines, personal care products, agrichemicals, microplastics, coal-tar sealants, flame retardants, and many more.

 

Government leaders, policy makers, public health professionals, researchers, environmental organizations, educators, students, and members of the public are all encouraged to attend the conference. It will provide an opportunity for discussion and collaboration with those from a wide range of fields in research, policy, and education & outreach. The conference will be held from May 31 to June 1, 2017, at the I Hotel & Conference Center in Champaign, IL.

Visit the website to find out more information, meet the keynote speakers, register for the conference, or submit a poster abstract on your work.

Emerging Contaminants in Our Aquatic Environments

pill bottle spilling out pills with one big pill colored with the pattern of earth's suface specifically north americaAmericans landfilled 136 million tons of material in 2014. Food, plastics, and in fact, most of what was landfilled could have been recycled or composted. Of particular concern is the more than four percent of waste classified as ‘other,’ which includes pharmaceuticals and personal-care products.

 

A recent article, “Pharmaceuticals and Other Chemicals Common in Landfill Waste,” brings light to the fact that rain water filtering through a landfill picks up chemicals and exits the landfill as ‘leachate.’ While treatment of the leachate and NPDES permitting is required, questions about how these chemicals affect the environment still remain.

 

The USGS sampled 19 landfill leachates before treatment and found 129 different pharmaceutical (prescription and non-prescription), household, and industrial chemicals. The three chemicals detected in 95 percent of the samples were bisphenol A (used in plastics, thermal paper, and epoxy resins; 4 parts per million), DEET (insect repellent; 250 parts per billion), and cotinine (transformation product of nicotine; 50 parts per billion).

 

In order to help address some of these questions and many more, ISTC is partnering with Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant (IISG) to host the “Emerging Contaminants in the Aquatic Environment Conference” on May 31 and June 1, 2017, in Champaign, IL. Conference registration will begin in mid-February. Topics will include research, policy, management, outreach, and education concerning emerging contaminant detection, fate, transport, remediation, prevention, or related areas.

 

Resources

Sustainability Seminar Series Fall 2016: Contaminants in the Environment

The ISTC Sustainability Seminar Series continues on Thursdays this fall with the theme “Contaminants in the Environment.” The schedule of seminar speakers is below. To be added to the seminar and events email list or to receive links to the live broadcasts of the seminars, please contact Beth Meschewski at elm2@illinois.edu.

 

All seminars will be held at ISTC (1 E. Hazelwood Dr. in Champaign) in the SJW Conference Room. The series is an opportunity to share information and discussion with peers in a relaxed, informal environment. Please feel free to bring a lunch. Seminars usually last about an hour and questions are welcome. The seminars will be broadcast live and will also be recorded and archived on the ISTC website: www.istc.illinois.edu.   Continue reading “Sustainability Seminar Series Fall 2016: Contaminants in the Environment”

Walgreens Creates New Medicine Take-Back Program

Walgreens logoWalgreens has started a medicine take back program at select Walgreens in Illinois.  If all goes well, they will be expanding the program to other states later this year. A full list of take-back locations and more details about the program can be found in their press release.

 

There are a variety of reasons to take advantage of such programs. One of the most important reasons, fighting drug abuse – a national public health and safety concern.  Another reason is to prevent accidental contamination of the environment. Find out more information on how medicines and personal care products enter the environment, affect plants and animals, and potential solutions on ISTC’s website.

 

Many Illinois communities have already started take-back programs.  Typically the drop boxes are located at police stations. Find a drop box in your community by visiting the Illinois EPA’s searchable map.

 

Don’t already have a medicine take-back program in your community? You can start your own local take-back program. Visit the Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant’s (IISG) website to learn more. IISG may have funding opportunities or could help procure funding assistance for your community.

 

Resources:

Academic/Government Partners Work Toward the Next Level in Home Water Filtration

ISTC NEWS


Nanoparticle Membrane Technology Investigated for Commercial Viability  

gold membrane for water filtration
Illustration of free-standing gold membrane with nanoparticles 6 nanometers in diameter and openings of 2 micrometers.

ISTC’s Nandakishore Rajagopalan and Wei Zheng are part of a team of experts from government and academia who are working to improve the filtration of household drinking water using new ultrathin nanoparticle-based membranes to remove trace organic contaminants (TrOCs).

 

The U.S. Department of Energy will fund the work through its Technology Commercialization Fund, which moves promising energy technologies developed by 12 national laboratories and their research partners to the marketplace. ISTC will assist in the testing the performance of prototype TrOCs filtration membrane devices which may be commercially viable for the home water filtration market. The primary investigator on the project is Xiao-Min Lin, a scientist at Argonne’s Center for Nanoscale Materials and at the James Franck Institute, University of Chicago.

 

Argonne National Laboratory and the University of Chicago developed the technology for the new membrane structure using gold nanoparticles which are strong and porous, and which can be ‘dialed’ to selectively trap different contaminants by engineering the ligand on the particle surface. A ligand is a molecule that binds to a central metal atom to form a complex that helps to protect the nanoparticle and introduce additional functionalities. Laboratory measurements have demonstrated the nanoparticle based membrane can selectively filter out molecules as small as 2 micrometers, yet has water permeability far higher than conventional polymer-based membranes.

 

For two years, scientists at Argonne, ISTC and the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District (MWRD) of Greater Chicago have been conferring on the problem of removing TrOCs from potable water supplies. Such contaminants consist of hormones, pesticides, prescription medications, personal care products, synthetic industrial chemicals, and chemicals formed during wastewater and drinking-water treatment processes. Even at very low concentrations these molecules can negatively affect aquatic environments and are of concern for human health impacts.

 

“Modern wastewater treatment plants were not designed to remove such materials, especially at such low concentrations,” said Wei Zheng, a senior research scientist at ISTC.

 

The search has been ongoing for methods to remove TrOCs including biodegradation, photolysis, volatization, and sorption. “We hope a gold nanoparticle-based membrane approach will improve the sorption efficiency of TrOC removal at low pressure and low energy — at a cost that makes it widely available for home filtration,” he said.

 

“Deploying new clean energy technologies is an essential part of our nation’s effort to lead in the 21st century economy and in the fight against climate change,” said Lynn Orr, DOE’s Under Secretary for Science and Energy in announcing the grant. DOE’s Technology Commercialization Fund “will help to accelerate the commercialization of cutting-edge energy technologies developed in our national labs, making them more widely available to American consumers and businesses.”

Drugs vs. Sharps Disposal: A safety issue

Drugs

colored unlabeled pills spilling from an amber pill bottleMany people are now aware that they shouldn’t flush unwanted drugs down the toilet because those chemicals end up in waterways and pollute the environment. So what is the correct way to dispose of unwanted medicine?

 

unwanted drug disposal bin inside lobby of police station in Champaign ILThe U.S. EPA recommends that unwanted drugs including prescriptions, over-the-counter, and pet medicines be disposed of though a one-day or permanent take-back program. These take-back programs are typically at local police stations or pharmacies. If and only if it is absolutely not feasible to take the unwanted drugs to a collection site, then the medicines should be mixed with kitty litter or coffee grounds, sealed in a water proof container, and placed in the trash. These safe disposal methods also reduce incidences of accidental poisonings in children, elderly, and pets and reduce drug abuse.

 

Sharps

sharps: needles, syringes, injection pens, etc...While the majority of drugs are taken by pill, some require injection which leaves behind needles and syringes, called sharps. Sharps have special disposal requirements because once they have touched a person’s blood they are then considered biohazardous materials and can be vectors for the spread of certain diseases. Because of this risk, sharps are not allowed in household recycling bins or in the take-back program bins or at household hazardous waste collection sites. Residents are allowed to place sharps in ridged plastic containers sealed with duct tape with the words “do not recycle” on the outside and then place the containers into the trash. But this method is not the safest for the environment or for landfill employees. The best method recommended by the U.S. EPA is to find a sharps collection site (typically at hospitals) or use a mail-back program.

 

certified sharps disposal containersOnce the drugs and sharps are collected by their designated collectors, they are securely transported to a special medical incinerator that is designed to handle these types of waste streams with specialized equipment to prevent environmental pollution.

 

More Reading

Illinois Teachers Prepare for Lessons on Impact of Drugs in Environment

Proper disposal of unwanted prescription drugs and other common chemicals is important because of their ability to alter living things when introduced into lakes and streams.
Proper disposal of unwanted prescription drugs and other common chemicals is important because of their ability to alter living things when introduced into lakes and streams.

School teachers from across Illinois attended a workshop at the Illinois Sustainable technology Center June 15-16 to help them develop curricula about the risks of improper disposal of pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) and the impacts of these emerging contaminants on the environment.

 

The training was conducted with the Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant College Program as part of a grant by the University of Illinois Extension to help raise awareness about the importance of proper disposal of unwanted prescription drugs and other common chemicals because of their ability to alter living things when introduced into lakes and streams.

 

According to Rebecca Wattleworth, a veteran teacher at Decatur’s Warrensburg-Latham High School, students and their families will benefit from these messages in their science classes. “When they come into my classroom they often do not realize the impact they have on the environment with their everyday activities,” she said. “They think when they throw it away, litter, etc. (that) it is just gone. Out of sight, out of mind.”

 

Wattleworth said she enrolled in the PPCP teacher workshop so she is prepared to show her students that their actions have consequences. “I want my students to learn that their everyday activities will have an impact in some way on the environment and that they need to be making better/safer choices for both the environment and us!”

 

Geoffrey Freymuth, a science teacher at Jefferson Middle School in Champaign, is attending the workshop to develop activities for his science enrichment class, as well as for the school’s student Green Team. “It has been my experience that students can have a great impact on the behaviors of their families and their habits,” he said. “I would like my students to be able to set up and design a local campaign on the issue or even find a way to test/evaluate local waters etc.,” he added.

 

Joni White, a science instructor at Urbana High School said “As an environmental science teacher, I am well aware that this is an often overlooked problem that seriously impacts the environment. I am eager to learn more about what is being done about it so that I can communicate its importance to my students.” She added “From a personal perspective, I am also a veterinarian and well aware of the medical field issue of pharmaceuticals ending up in the water supply.”

 

In an experiment designed for teachers to use in their classrooms, the workshop participants measured the effect of increasing concentrations of common PPCPs on growth of lettuce sprouts. The compounds used were Aspirin, road salt, and Epsom salt.
In an experiment designed for teachers to use in their classrooms, the workshop participants measured the effect of increasing concentrations of common PPCPs on growth of lettuce sprouts. The compounds used were Aspirin, road salt (MgCl2), and Epsom salt (MgSO4).

Each year, unwanted medications account for accidental poisonings and drug abuse and for environmental problems. The workshops will help this information about PPCPs become a part of each school’s curriculum, according to Nancy Holm, ISTC assistant director. “There are a number of sources of PPCPs to the environment but reducing as much improper disposal as possible is a step in the right direction.”

 

Recent studies reflect the growing concern about how these compounds enter the aquatic environment and their effects on wildlife.

 

  • Salmon in Puget Sound (Seattle) were found to be contaminated with antidepressants, pain killers, anti-inflammatants, fungicides, antiseptics, anticoagulants, and antibiotics. A total of 81 PPCP chemicals from nicotine and caffeine to OxyContin and cocaine.

 

 

  • Research by ISTC was among the first to confirm that the common antiseptic, Triclosan, was causing antibiotic resistance among bacteria in lakes and streams.

 

“This is a threat to public health and also the health of our ecosystems that every family has a direct role in preventing,” Holm added. “By providing this information to teachers they can then present this information to hundreds of students each year who can work to spread the word in their communities.”

 

Proper Disposal of Unwanted Drugs Getting Easier

Got Drugs?

 

 

dropboxes for unwanted drugs
Handy, secure dropboxes at Champaign, Urbana and U of I police stations make disposing of unwanted drugs easy.

 

Saturday April 30 is National Prescription Take-Back Day in the U.S.A. The Drug Enforcement Administration has organized a network of local law enforcement agencies to accept unwanted or expired human or veterinary drugs and to educate the public about the need to properly dispose of these medications.

 

Check DEA’s handy collection site locator  if you want to drop off your drugs between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday, April 30.

 

If you live in the Champaign-Urbana area you can use secure dropboxes ANYTIME in the lobbies of the following police departments:

 

Champaign: 82 E University Ave.

 

Urbana: 400 S Vine St.

 

University of Illinois: 1110 W Springfield Ave, Urbana.

 

Of course the DEA is interested in halting abuse of unused drugs which are often misappropriated from the home medicine cabinets. But a DEA news release makes the alarming understatement that “Americans are now advised that their usual methods for disposing of unused medicines—flushing them down the toilet or throwing them in the trash—both pose potential safety and health hazards.” To keep unused medications out of the reach of children and pets and also to prevent abuse by others taking the medications, all unused medications should be taken to drop box collection sites.  You should keep the medications in their original containers and black out your name and address if on the label before dropping them off.

 

Information on ISTC’s recent research on the emerging problem is available online. A lot more about proper handling and disposal of drugs and personal care products is provided by IL-IN Sea Grant.

 

ISTC, IL-IN Sea Grant, and the U of I Extension are now working together to improve pharmaceutical give-back locations state-wide. Scientific studies are revealing the bio-active compounds are having observable consequences when they get into the aquatic environment.

PPCPs in the Environment Conference – Registration Open!

Registration for the Pharmaceutical and Personal Care Products (PPCPs) in the Environment conference is open now until March 18, 2016!

We are expecting an excellent conference with a wide range of topics from detecting PPCPs in the environment, education on the topic, and impacts on human and animal health. Our Keynote speakers reflect the diverse research topics related to PPCPs in the environment. Check out our agenda for more details on the conference.

Continue reading “PPCPs in the Environment Conference – Registration Open!”

2016 Teacher Workshop on PPCPs in the Environment

collored unlabeled pills spilling from an amber pill bottle ISTC and the Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant will be hosting a teacher workshop on pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) in the environment. PPCPs encompass thousands of chemicals found in fragrances, cosmetics, over-the-counter drugs, and human and veterinary medicines. The U.S. EPA has identified PPCPs as emerging contaminants of concern because little is known about their impacts on ecosystems or risks to human health when they are released into the environment.

unlabeled personal care products bottles

 

If you are a teacher interested in learning more or know of a teacher who might be interested, please visit our PPCPs Teacher Workshop website for more information or to register for the workshop.

 

Teachers will have the opportunity to earn up to 8 professional development hours and a $100 stipend.

Details

WHEN? One Day: June 15 or 16, 2016, 8 AM to 5 PM

 

WHERE? Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC), 1 E. Hazelwood Drive, Champaign, IL 61820 (Google Maps location of ISTC)

 

WHO? Illinois and Indiana middle and high school and preservice science teachers can register.

 

COST? FREE with lunch provided plus a $100 stipend!

 

DEADLINE? Registration is open now until May 4, 2016, or until full. Registration is LIMITED to 30 participants per day. Don’t delay in registering!

 

men and women collaborating around a table with papers and charts