Environmental performance of a full-scale wastewater treatment plant applying Life Cycle Assessment

Lopes, Thaís Andrade de Sampaio; Queiroz, Luciano Matos; Kiperstok, Asher

doi:10.4136/ambi-agua.2216

Cited by 8 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) studies assessing and comparing the environmental impacts from the operation of CWs and CAS systems also show similar results with the present analysis [e.g. [30][31][32][33][34]. Garfí et al [30] performed LCA to assess the environmental impacts of a CAS based WWTP of 1,500 p.e.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Energy savings and reduced emissions in combined natural and engineered systems for wastewater treatment and reuse: the WWTP of Antiparos Island, Greece

Stathatou¹,

Dedousis²,

Arampatzis³

et al. 2019

DWT

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Europe's water service providers are under increasing pressure to deliver improved and affordable water services to a growing population, whilst reducing the amount of energy used, lowering the environmental impact of water and wastewater treatment processes, and coping with climate change. These challenges have prompted research on natural processes for wastewater treatment, such as constructed wetlands (CWs), providing low-energy treatment potential and storage capacity. As the performance of natural treatment processes may be limited by several factors (e.g. climatic conditions, space restrictions), considerable research concentrates on investigating their combination with engineered pre-or post-treatment processes to improve their performance and increase their treatment resilience. The aim of this paper is to assess and demonstrate the advantages of combined natural and engineered systems (cNES) over purely engineered treatment systems with regard to energy savings and reduced environmental impacts. The case of a cNES located in the island of Antiparos in Greece for the treatment and reuse of municipal effluents is investigated, focusing on the energy savings and the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the natural treatment process. The performance of the system, which involves CWs for the secondary treatment of effluents, was assessed using an integrated modelling and simulation environment (baseline scenario). An alternative scenario was also built, substituting the CWs with a conventional activated sludge (CAS) process for the secondary treatment of effluents to achieve the same effluent quality as in the baseline scenario. Energy consumption and generation of GHG emissions was assessed for both scenarios, and a comparison between the two systems was conducted, highlighting the significant energy savings and the reduced GHG emissions produced by the cNES: the CAS system consumed about 3,000 times more energy, producing about 50 times more total GHG emissions compared with CWs. The results of the current analysis demonstrated that cNES involving CWs can provide a competitive alternative to purely engineered systems for wastewater treatment and reuse in isolated insular communities and small municipalities, also contributing to water scarcity reduction.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Energy savings and reduced emissions in combined natural and engineered systems for wastewater treatment and reuse: the WWTP of Antiparos Island, Greece

Stathatou¹,

Dedousis²,

Arampatzis³

et al. 2019

DWT

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“…For the nitrification process, the average reduction of NH3 in the TFs was 43%. Similar results were obtained by Lopes et al (2018) in vertical wetlands as a post-treatment step for UASB reactors. The estimate of biogas production in the UASB reactors was 341 m 3 .d -1 .…”

Section: Environmental Inventory Of the Processes Used In The Stpsupporting

confidence: 86%

Evaluation of the environmental life cycle of an STP that employs a low-rate trickling filter as post-treatment of a UASB reactor and different sludge-management alternatives

Amaral¹,

Rietow²,

Aisse³

2021

Rev. ambiente água

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This study aimed to undertake an environmental life cycle assessment (LCA) of a sewage treatment plant (STP) equipped with low-rate trickling filters (TFs) as post-treatment of upflow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB). The STP is located in South Brazil and uses landfill and agriculture as sludge-disposal alternatives. The evaluation was performed using the LCA technique and SimaPro® 9 software. The results revealed that the gases methane (CH4) and sulfur dioxide (SO2), emitted into the atmosphere after the partial burning of the biogas in flares, are mainly responsible for impacts in the categories of global warming (GW) and terrestrial acidification (TA), respectively. Due to the low rate of hydraulic sewage application in TFs, nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions stood out due to their high impact in the category of stratospheric ozone depletion (SOD). The use of sludge in agriculture obtained a greater potential for environmental impact compared to landfills in five of the eight categories evaluated. The main impacts of agricultural use were in the category of human toxicity (HT), due to the high concentration of zinc present in the sludge, and in the category TA, due to the emission of ammonia (NH3) during hygienization of the sludge. In turn, the main positive aspects were avoided products, such as urea, phosphate fertilizer and limestone. The results contribute to a greater discussion of sewage-treatment processes, as well as sludge-management alternatives used in developing countries.

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“…High greenhouse gas emissions could be explained by these contributions (approximately 27%) during anaerobic treatment and the land for building IC systems or capturing gas. The significant effect of the greenhouse gas from the anaerobic process on the environment has been mentioned elsewhere (Lopes et al 2018;Gallego-Schmid & Tarpani 2019).…”

Section: Ic Stagementioning

confidence: 99%

Life cycle assessment of paper mill wastewater: a case study in Viet Nam

Bui

Chen

Anh

et al. 2022

Water Science and Technology

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Although in a critical position in the economy, the paper industry releases a lot of wastewater that requires adequate treatment for sustainable development. This study presents an application of Life cycle assessment (LCA) with ReCiPe tool on the wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) of a paper factory in Vietnam to evaluate the environmental effect of the individual techniques in WWTP, especially internal circulation (IC) reactor, a pioneer and practical anaerobic technology. Both Midpoint and Endpoint categories results demonstrated that chemical use and electricity consumption mainly contributed to the environmental impact in the WWTP. The Dissolved air flotation (DAF) and Moving bed biofilm reactor (MBBR) are classified as effective techniques to reduce the impacts on the environment. Moreover, the comparison of LCA between IC and up-flow anaerobic sludge bed (UASB) shows that IC is the better practically green technique on the environment.

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Environmental performance of a full-scale wastewater treatment plant applying Life Cycle Assessment

Cited by 8 publications

References 16 publications

Energy savings and reduced emissions in combined natural and engineered systems for wastewater treatment and reuse: the WWTP of Antiparos Island, Greece

Energy savings and reduced emissions in combined natural and engineered systems for wastewater treatment and reuse: the WWTP of Antiparos Island, Greece

Evaluation of the environmental life cycle of an STP that employs a low-rate trickling filter as post-treatment of a UASB reactor and different sludge-management alternatives

Life cycle assessment of paper mill wastewater: a case study in Viet Nam

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