Per‐ and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are now thought to be far more prevalent in water bodies across the globe than previously reported. In particular, military bases, airports, and industrial sites are prone to contamination caused by runoff discharges from fire‐extinguishing waters that contain PFAS such as aqueous film‐forming foams (AFFF). These substances and their metabolites show a high degree of mobility as well as a low biotic and abiotic degradability; as a result, they are bioaccumulative and often migrate among the environmental compartments in addition to being toxic. As of now, there is no suitable end‐of‐life treatment process that is both technologically efficient and cost‐effective for the handling of PFAS. Currently, the incineration of the collected extinguishing water at temperatures above 1100 °C is the recommended method for the disposal of PFAS to degrade material compounds. However, this method consumes extensive energy because it requires incineration of large quantities of water to treat a diluted fraction of PFAS. Aside from incineration, adsorption of PFAS on granulated activated carbon is one of the most widely used technologies, albeit with poor adsorption and often requiring very large downstream filtration systems. Finally, the application of functional precipitation agents using commercially available cationic surfactants is a novel approach (PerfluorAd^® [Cornelsen] process) that enables the effective precipitation of PFAS from the spent fire‐extinguishing waters. Hence, the goal of the present study was to investigate the environmental impacts emanating from the proper treatment of spent fire‐extinguishing water with the aforementioned 3 end‐of‐life treatment scenarios. A life cycle assessment was conducted for this purpose. The results show that the PerfluorAd process outperforms the other 2 treatment technologies across all environmental impact categories except for ozone depletion. Environ Toxicol Chem 2021;40:947–957. © 2020 The Authors. Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of SETAC.

中文翻译：

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处理废灭火水中全氟和多氟烷基物质的各种报废途径的环境评估

现在人们认为全氟和多氟烷基物质 (PFAS) 在全球水体中的普遍性比以前报道的要高得多。特别是，军事基地、机场和工业场所很容易受到含有 PFAS 的灭火用水的径流排放造成的污染，例如水性成膜泡沫 (AFFF)。这些物质及其代谢物具有高度的流动性以及较低的生物和非生物降解性；因此，它们具有生物累积性，除了有毒之外，还经常在环境隔间之间迁移。到目前为止，还没有合适的报废处理工艺在处理 PFAS 时既具有技术效率又具有成本效益。目前，在 1100 °C 以上的温度下焚烧收集的灭火水是处理 PFAS 以降解材料化合物的推荐方法。然而，这种方法消耗大量能源，因为它需要焚烧大量的水来处理稀释的 PFAS 部分。除了焚烧，PFAS 在颗粒活性炭上的吸附是最广泛使用的技术之一，尽管吸附性较差并且通常需要非常大的下游过滤系统。最后，使用市售阳离子表面活性剂的功能沉淀剂的应用是一种新方法（PerfluorAd 这种方法消耗大量能源，因为它需要焚烧大量的水来处理稀释的 PFAS 部分。除了焚烧，PFAS 在颗粒活性炭上的吸附是最广泛使用的技术之一，尽管吸附性较差并且通常需要非常大的下游过滤系统。最后，使用市售阳离子表面活性剂的功能沉淀剂的应用是一种新方法（PerfluorAd 这种方法消耗大量能源，因为它需要焚烧大量的水来处理稀释的 PFAS 部分。除了焚烧，PFAS 在颗粒活性炭上的吸附是最广泛使用的技术之一，尽管吸附性较差并且通常需要非常大的下游过滤系统。最后，使用市售阳离子表面活性剂的功能沉淀剂的应用是一种新方法（PerfluorAd^® [Cornelsen] 工艺），使 PFAS 从用过的灭火水中有效沉淀出来。因此，本研究的目的是调查使用上述 3 种报废处理方案对用过的灭火水进行适当处理所产生的环境影响。为此目的进行了生命周期评估。结果表明，除臭氧消耗外，PerfluorAd 工艺在所有环境影响类别中均优于其他两种处理技术。环境毒理学化学2021；40：947-957。© 2020 作者。环境毒理学和化学由 Wiley Periodicals LLC 代表 SETAC 出版。