Decontamination of Pharmaceutical Industry Wastewater: Treatment Options and Lessons Learned

Bio-pharmaceutical research and manufacturing facilities routinely culture bacteria and viruses to produce various products including vaccines and other human and animal health related medical treatments. These biological agents are potentially present in wastewater associated with these operations. Decentralized wastewater treatment systems, often referred to as effluent decontamination systems (EDS), are used to eliminate potentially infectious agents prior to discharging wastewater to the publicly owned treatment works (POTW) or surface water. This paper offers a comparison of available treatment options for decontamination of pharmaceutical wastewater, discusses best practices for planning treatability testing and considerations for full-scale design, and presents a case study of a chemical effluent decontamination system used to inactivate wastewater from a biologics manufacturing facility.