Spatial assessment of tap-water safety in China

Mengjie Liu, Nigel Graham, Wenyu Wang, Renzun Zhao, Yonglong Lu, Menachem Elimelech () and Wenzheng Yu ()
Additional contact information
Mengjie Liu: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Nigel Graham: Imperial College London
Wenyu Wang: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Renzun Zhao: North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University
Yonglong Lu: Xiamen University
Menachem Elimelech: Yale University
Wenzheng Yu: Chinese Academy of Sciences

Nature Sustainability, 2022, vol. 5, issue 8, 689-698

Abstract: Abstract The quality of drinking-water supplies is of fundamental importance to public health and sustainable development. Here, we provide a spatial assessment of the tap-water quality across mainland China. We examine natural and anthropogenic origins of low quality as well as its association with public health risks. By quantifying key indicators, including total organic carbon, ionic conductivity and disinfection by-products (DBPs), we find that precipitation is a crucial factor driving the change of organic matter content and ionic conductivity of tap-water, especially for arid and semi-arid regions. Although the concentration of DBPs is closely related to the organic matter content, the occurrence of highly toxic DBPs is more subject to anthropogenic factors such as economic development and pollution emission. We show that nanofiltration is an effective point-of-use treatment to reduce the adverse effects of DBPs. The present results highlight the potential health hazards associated with low-quality drinking water, suggesting that countries and regions experiencing rapid socioeconomical development might face high levels of DBP toxicity and should consider adoption of sustainability solutions.

Date: 2022
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-022-00898-5 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natsus:v:5:y:2022:i:8:d:10.1038_s41893-022-00898-5

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/natsustain/

DOI: 10.1038/s41893-022-00898-5

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Sustainability is currently edited by Monica Contestabile

More articles in Nature Sustainability from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().