Abstract: This study presents the occurrance,adsorption characteristic and fate of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in wastewater and sludges collected from high concentration wastewater treatment plant of coal liquefaction. Twenty-six VOCs were detected cumulatively by headspace coupled with gas chromatography / mass spectrometry (HS / GC / MS) in the effluent of each treatment unit. The most abundant compounds are BTEX of Benzene,Ethylbenzene,Styrene,Tolu- ene and (O / M / P)xylene etc. with total concentrations ranging from 266. 22 to 527. 45 μg / L,and the total VOCs at concentrations from 339. 28 to 562. 36 μg / L;the highest concentration pollution in all sludges from four units of sludge generated is due to Benzene or Styrene,and both the maximal adsorption to ΣVOCs and the sludge-water partitioning coefficients (Kd ) of each VOC monomer are observed in 3T activated sludge. Under the relatively stable adsorbent,the adsorption would be stronger with the increase of octanol-water partition coefficient ( lg Kow ). In the process of wastewater treatment,wastewater-following discharge is the main fate pathway for the ΣVOCs (accounted for 60. 33%of the initial loadings),followed by the sludge adsorption and volatilization / biodegradation (22. 95% and 16. 72% re- spectively). With the increase of lg Kow ,the outflow discharge removal rate of VOC monomers decreased,but a gradu- ally increase of adsorption removal was found,and a peak in removal of VOCs through volatilization / biodegradation was observed around a lg Kow value of 3. 5.