1 research outputs found
Estimating Potential Increased Bladder Cancer Risk Due to Increased Bromide Concentrations in Sources of Disinfected Drinking Waters
Public water systems are increasingly
facing higher bromide levels
in their source waters from anthropogenic contamination through coal-fired
power plants, conventional oil and gas extraction, textile mills,
and hydraulic fracturing. Climate change is likely to exacerbate this
in coming years. We estimate bladder cancer risk from potential increased
bromide levels in source waters of disinfecting public drinking water
systems in the United States. Bladder cancer is the health end point
used by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in
its benefits analysis for regulating disinfection byproducts in drinking
water. We use estimated increases in the mass of the four regulated
trihalomethanes (THM4) concentrations (due to increased bromide incorporation)
as the surrogate disinfection byproduct (DBP) occurrence metric for
informing potential bladder cancer risk. We estimate potential increased
excess lifetime bladder cancer risk as a function of increased source
water bromide levels. Results based on data from 201 drinking water
treatment plants indicate that a bromide increase of 50 μg/L
could result in a potential increase of between 10<sup>–3</sup> and 10<sup>–4</sup> excess lifetime bladder cancer risk in populations served by roughly 90% of these plants