Life cycle assessment of high rate algal ponds for wastewater treatment and resource recovery

Municipal sewage contains significant embedded resources in the form of chemical and thermal energy. Recent developments in sustainable technology have pushed for the integration of resource recovery from household wastewater to achieve net zero energy consumption and carbon-neutral communities. Sewage heat recovery and fit-for-purpose water reuse are options to optimize the resource recovery potential of municipal wastewater. This study presents a comparative life cycle assessment (LCA) focused on global warming potential (GWP), eutrophication potential (EUP), and human health carcinogenic potential (HHCP) of an integrated sewage heat recovery and water reuse system for a hypothetical community of 30,000 people. Conventional space and water heating components generally demonstrated the highest GWP contribution between the different system components evaluated. Sewage-heat-recovery-based district heating offered better environmental performance overall. Lower impact contributions were demonstrated by scenarios with a membrane bioreactor (MBR) and chlorination prior to water reuse applications compared to scenarios that use more traditional water and wastewater treatment technologies and discharge. The LCA findings show that integrating MBR wastewater treatment and water reuse into a district heating schema could provide additional environmental savings at a community scale.

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Comparing environmental impacts of tertiary wastewater treatment technologies for advanced phosphorus removal and disinfection with life cycle assessment

Water Science & Technology ◽

10.2166/wst.2014.087 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 69 (8) ◽

pp. 1742-1750 ◽

Cited By ~ 23

Author(s):

C. Remy ◽

U. Miehe ◽

B. Lesjean ◽

C. Bartholomäus

Keyword(s):

Wastewater Treatment ◽

Life Cycle Assessment ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Environmental Impacts ◽

Treatment Plant ◽

High Rate ◽

Phosphorus Concentration ◽

Secondary Effluent ◽

Low Phosphorus ◽

Gravity Driven

Different technologies for tertiary wastewater treatment are compared in their environmental impacts with life cycle assessment (LCA). Targeting very low phosphorus concentration (50–120 μg/L) and seasonal disinfection of wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) secondary effluent, this LCA compares high-rate sedimentation, microsieve, dual media filtration (all with UV disinfection), and polymer ultrafiltration or ceramic microfiltration membranes for upgrading the large WWTP Berlin-Ruhleben. Results of the LCA show that mean effluent quality of membranes is highest, but at the cost of high electricity and chemical demand and associated emissions of greenhouse gases or other air pollutants. In contrast, gravity-driven treatment processes require less electricity and chemicals, but can reach significant removal of phosphorus. In fact, dual media filter or microsieve cause substantially lower specific CO2 emissions per kg P removed from the secondary effluent (180 kg CO2-eq/kg P, including UV) than the membrane schemes (275 kg CO2-eq/kg P).

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Retrofitting Municipal Wastewater Treatment Facilities toward a Greener and Circular Economy by Virtue of Resource Recovery: Techno-Economic Analysis and Life Cycle Assessment

ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering ◽

10.1021/acssuschemeng.0c05189 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 8 (36) ◽

pp. 13823-13837 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Xueyu Tian ◽

Ruth E. Richardson ◽

Jefferson W. Tester ◽

José L. Lozano ◽

Fengqi You

Keyword(s):

Wastewater Treatment ◽

Life Cycle Assessment ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Economic Analysis ◽

Circular Economy ◽

Municipal Wastewater ◽

Resource Recovery ◽

Municipal Wastewater Treatment ◽

Treatment Facilities

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Evaluating new processes and concepts for energy and resource recovery from municipal wastewater with life cycle assessment

Water Science & Technology ◽

10.2166/wst.2015.569 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 73 (5) ◽

pp. 1074-1080 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

C. Remy ◽

M. Boulestreau ◽

J. Warneke ◽

P. Jossa ◽

C. Kabbe ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Wastewater Treatment ◽

Life Cycle Assessment ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Environmental Impacts ◽

Municipal Wastewater ◽

Wastewater Treatment Plants ◽

Resource Recovery ◽

Holistic View ◽

Iso 14040 ◽

Using Data

Energy and resource recovery from municipal wastewater is a pre-requisite for an efficient and sustainable water management in cities of the future. However, a sound evaluation of available processes and pathways is required to identify opportunities and short-comings of the different options and reveal synergies and potentials for optimization. For evaluating environmental impacts in a holistic view, the tool of life cycle assessment (LCA, ISO 14040/44) is suitable to characterize and quantify the direct and indirect effects of new processes and concepts. This paper gives an overview of four new processes and concepts for upgrading existing wastewater treatment plants towards energy positive and resource efficient wastewater treatment, based upon an evaluation of their environmental impacts with LCA using data from pilot and full-scale assessments of the considered processes.

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