The objective of this study is to clarify the relationships between the characteristics of dissolved organic nitrogen (DON) and disinfection by-products (DBPs) formation. Treated wastewater effluents from the Neihu wastewater treatment plant in Taipei City (TN) and source waters from the Tai Lake water treatment plant in Kinmen (KT) were evaluated. These water samples were fractionated to obtain 7 DON isolates with different characteristics. The DON isolates were freeze-dried and re-dissolved to different DON fraction solutions containing 10 mg-C/L of non-purgeable dissolved organic carbon (NPDOC). The DBPs formation potentials (DBPFPs) (trihalomethanes (THMs), haloacetic acids (HAAs), and nitrosamines) of different DON fraction solutions were then assessed with chlorine and monochloramine treatments. After fractionation schemes, mass concentrations of dried DON-enriched isolates ranged from 0.2 to 46.4 mg/L. Both TN effluents and KT raw waters had similar compositions of DON fractions except for the amounts of amphiphilic bases/neutrals (AMPB/N) isolates: hydrophobic acids (HPOA) > hydrophilic acids/neutrals (HPIA/N) > AMPB/N of KT raw waters > hydrophilic bases (HPIB) > amphiphilic acids (AMPA) > hydrophobic bases/neutrals (HPOB/N) > AMPB/N of TN effluents > amino acids (AA). For carbonated DBPs (C-DBPs), AA fraction treated with NaOCl formed the greatest amounts of C-DBPs (up to 1258.2 μg/L of THMs and 1140.6 μg/L of HAAs). For nitrogenated DBPs (N-DBPs), the AMPB/N fraction (DON = 1.4 mg-N/L) treated with NH2Cl was the most important precursor to form N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) and generated up to 9238.0 ng/L of NDMA from KT raw water. Taking both DBP formation and organic composition into account, the HPOA (31.9%-38.4%)/HPIA/N (17.6%-35.7%) fractions and AMPB/N fraction (38.4%-93.9%) were the most important contributors to the overall C-DBPFPs and N-DBPFPs, respectively.
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