anthracite is globally used as a filter material for water purification. herein, it was found that up to 15 disinfection byproducts (dbps) were formed in the chlorination of anthracite-filtered pure water, while the levels of dbps were below the detection limit in the chlorination of zeolite-, quartz sand-, and porcelain sandstone-filtered pure water. in new-anthracite-filtered water, the levels of dissolved organic carbon (doc), dissolved organic nitrogen (don), and ammonia nitrogen (nh3–n) ranged from 266.3 to 305.4 μg/l, 37 to 61 μg/l, and 8.6 to 17.1 μg/l, respectively. in aged anthracite (collected from a filter at a dwtp after one year of operation) filtered water, the levels of the above substances ranged from 475.1 to 597.5 μg/l, 62.1 to 125.6 μg/l, and 14 to 28.9 μg/l, respectively. anthracite would release dissolved substances into filtered water, and aged anthracite releases more substances than new anthracite. the released organics were partly (around 5%) composed by the μg/l level of toxic and carcinogenic aromatic carbons including pyridine, paraxylene, benzene, naphthalene, and phenanthrene, while over 95% of the released organics could not be identified. organic carbon may be torn off from the carbon skeleton structure of anthracite due to hydrodynamic force in the water filtration process.
