The application of innovative technologies in water management, such as wastewater reuse, requires a deeper understanding of emerging pollutants, including pharmaceuticals. This study presents a unique pilot site at Horní Beřkovice in Central Bohemia, where wastewater parameters are significantly influenced by the effluent from a local psychiatric hospital, and where the treated wastewater infiltrates into a shallow aquifer over a long period. The survey compared the quality parameters of local wastewater with those of the wastewater in four other catchments with no sources of concentrated pharmaceutical contamination. A total of 10 pharmaceuticals were detected while monitoring a common sewage system, but their number increased 3-fold at Horní Beřkovice. The water quality data revealed the effectiveness of the removal of pharmaceuticals from wastewater at the local sewage treatment plant and tracked the fate of substances that move from the treatment plant into the recharge ponds and then gradually into groundwater. The findings showed a significant decrease in all the monitored micropollutants that remained bound in sediments and in the unsaturated zone. Their passage into groundwater was highly reduced, and they virtually disappear after a few hundred meters in the saturated zone. The only exception is carbamazepine. This substance passes through the treatment technology and unsaturated zone. It systematically appears in the groundwater samples collected about 1 km from the infiltration site.

The Káraný waterworks supplies drinking water to about one-third of Prague, the capital city of the Czech Republic with a population of more than 1 million. The combination of two technologies—bank infiltration and artificial recharge—are used for production of drinking water. The two-year monitoring of PPCPs (pharmaceuticals and personal care products) at monthly intervals observed temporal changes in 81 substances in the source river and groundwater, and the efficacy of contamination removal depended on the treatment technology used. The results showed a very wide range of PPCPs discharged from the waste water treatment plant at Mladá Boleslav into the Jizera River at concentrations ranging from ng/L to μg/L. Acesulfame and oxypurinol in concentrations exceeding 100 ng/L systematically occurred, and then a few tens of ng/L of carbamazepine, sulfamethoxazole, primidone, and lamotrigine were regularly detected at the water outlet using the artificial recharge for production of drinking water. Bank infiltration was found more efficient in removing PPCP substances at the Káraný locality where none of the monitored substances was systematically detected in the mixed sample.

Drought has always been one of the crucial water management issues especially in a dry climate areas. Recently this matter is emerging also in the Czech Republic and in other parts of the temperate and continental climate zone. With progressing climate changes, we can expect that the current water management systems will often have to adapt to new conditions. This paper offers an evaluation of artificial recharge as a drought mitigation method in areas with crystalline bedrock. The core of the study is a pilot location model solution, which provided a tool to assess the efficiency of artificial recharge, operated in order to improve water budged of a shallow hard-rock aquifer. The results of simulations confirmed suitability of artificial recharge through infiltrations wells or ponds, which significantly enhanced water budged of the experimental catchment and improved its potential as a water resource.

Velmi urgentní výzvou vodohospodářských organizací v České republice je problematika zadržování vody v krajině. Jedna z iniciativ státního podniku Povodí Labe