Emission of Dioxin-like Compounds and Flame Retardants from Commercial Facilities Handling Deca-BDE and Their Downstream Sewage Treatment Plants

Commercial mixtures of decabromodiphenyl ether (deca-BDE), a brominated flame retardant, contain not only polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs, mainly BDE-209) as the main component but also dioxin-like compounds (DLCs) such as polybrominated dibenzofurans (PBDFs). Deca-BDE handling facilities (DHFs) and sewage treatment plants receiving effluent from DHFs are point sources of DLC and flame retardant (FR) pollution. Here, we examined their emission in Japan. For DHF effluents, DLCs detected by the dioxin-responsive chemically activated luciferase expression (DR-CALUX) assay were 1.3–890 pg TCDD-EQ/L (median 46 pg TCDD-EQ/L), while PBDEs and other FRs were