Monitoring of Organic Micropollutants in Effluents as Crucial Tool in Sustainable Development

Water resources are crucial issues in sustainable development. From an economic perspective lack of clean water leads to long-lasting effects on human capital and growth. The key problem is to what extent can we give up on the economic growth to preserve the natural resources for future generations. Progress in monitoring will be critical in ensure to achieving sustainable development goals. However  monitoring of the status quo is not the only strategy. The better one is monitoring of pollutants discharging in order to prevent or at least to limit their amounts. At present, the afore mentioned monitoring is not carried out with respect to municipal effluents despite the fact that these contaminants are found in the treated wastewater and should be monitored  to avoid pollution of surface waters. The types of micropollutants that should be monitored have to be chosen individually for each wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) depending to local conditions that allows to fullfill the tasks  in sustainable development. Recent changes in Polish legislations relying on which organic micropollutants are considered when classification of surface and underground water is made, are the proper directions.