Music Festival
What you do at a festival could have a serious impact on the environment. Reuters

If you thought parents were the only people who worry about their kids going to music festivals, you can add environmentalists to that list. Researchers from Taiwan were analyzing the environmental impact of Spring Scream, a popular pop music festival that brings 600,000 people to the city of Kenting, and discovered a spike in the levels of Molly, or ecstasy, and ketamine in the surrounding rivers afterward.

The research, led by Chon-Line Lee, was designed to analyze levels of emerging contaminants -- drugs, pharmaceuticals and personal care products -- in freshwater to better understand the impact of these items on the environment. As the researchers explain, wastewater treatment facilities are not equipped or designed to handle such contaminants and removing them from the environment after a large event could be especially problematic. "Some have been shown to affect the behavior of fish and to have other adverse effects on the environment. Researchers are now starting to examine the timing of contaminant spikes in waterways and sewage -- for example, during Super Bowl weekend in the U.S. -- to help figure out how to address them," the American Chemical Association said in a statement.

Researchers collected samples from 30 sites, 28 river water locations and two wastewater locations, during four periods: off-season (October 2010), dry season (March 2011), Spring Scream (April 2011) and wet season (August 2011). Wastewater samples were collected each day during the music festival. Based on the analysis, emerging contaminant concentration was lowest during the off-season and peaked during Spring Scream. While there was no difference in amphetamine, methamphetamine and FM2 (rohypnol) levels during holidays, weekends and Spring Scream, the researchers did find increased levels in five contaminants: ecstasy, caffeine, acetaminophen, pseudoephedrine and ketamine.

Of the group, the increased levels of molly really surprised the researchers. "With respect to the tourist impacts, the most interesting finding was the extraordinary increase [89.1 to 940 nanograms per liter] in the party drug MDMA [ecstasy] during the youth festival. This drug was only detected at a very low level before and after the youth festival," the authors of the study wrote.

The study is interesting, but more research is necessary to determine the environmental impact of recreational drugs. "It was reported that the annual quantity of drugs seized in Taiwan reached 3,500 kilograms in 2011 and that ketamine (2,594 kg) accounted for 74 percent of the total drugs seized. Together with our findings, they implied that the problems of drug abuse and addiction during the youth festival, and consequent environmental issue are of concern," the authors conclude. The study was published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology.