Suspect screening of emerging micropollutants in wastewater treatment plant influent in Kuantan, Pahang using LC-QTOF-MS

Emerging micropollutants (EMPs) are contaminants released into the environment at trace levels and have recently become a focus of global research. A suspect screening analysis was conducted to investigate EMPs originating from pharmaceuticals, personal care products (PCPs), plasticizers, and flame retardants in 14 raw wastewater samples collected from wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) in Kuantan using liquid chromatography coupled with quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (LC-QTOF-MS). A total of 27 EMPs were identified from the chromatograms through comparison with a MS library and manual verification using a prepared in-house database. At least eight different compounds had been determined from each raw wastewater sample. Results showed that all samples were dominated by anti-inflammatory compounds such as triamcinolone, flurbiprofen, and ibuprofen were monitored in all WWTPs, followed by three PCPs, one plasticizer, and one flame retardants. No food additives were detected in this study. This finding highlighted that the pharmaceutical was predominant and the effluent should be investigated in future to assess the removal efficiency of WWTPs.