Occurrence of endotoxins in groundwater during the land application of wastewater

Abstract

Since sewage may contain high concentrations of bacterial endotoxin, the occurrence of endotoxin in groundwater underlying five sewage land application sites was studied. Endotoxin concentrations were found to range from 0.3 to 480 ng/ml in wells 3 to 37 m beneath these sites. Although these concentrations were higher than the native groundwater, a 90% to 99.9% reduction in endotoxin occurred during percolation of this sewage water through the soil.