Analysis of accidents at municipal wastewater treatment plants in Europe

The Effects of Wastewater Treatment Plant Failure on the Gulf of Gdansk (Southern Baltic Sea)

“…Understanding its effects on the surrounding environment, the Vistula river, its estuary, and the Baltic Sea’s shore is crucial to understand the probable impact of such accidents in the future and designing ways to counteract its consequences. This is especially crucial now since over 72% of previous WWTP accidents were caused by a combination of structural failure with extreme weather conditions, which are estimated to occur more frequently in the future, leading to an increased chance of another major WWTP accident [ 11 , 22 ]. Emergencies caused by accidents in WWTPs are a significant and growing problem.…”

“…The study showed that the highest number of accidents affected the entire WWTP facility and were not isolated to a specific component. The most common manifestation of WWTP failure was the environmental damage that included the pollution of surface waters, groundwaters, soil, and even air when the biogas was released into the atmosphere during the accident [ 11 ].…”

“…Given the sheer volume of raw wastewater released to the river, both failures of this WWTP were one of the largest WWTP accidents in the world. To date, the other significant malfunctions of WWTPs were the 2020 accident in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, U.S.A., with the release of over 1,045,000 m 3 of raw sewage [ 9 ]; an accident in 2017 in Tijuana, Mexico, with a release of over 540,000 m 3 wastewater into the Tijuana River; in 2006 in Waikiki, Hawaii, U.S.A., with the release of over 180,000 m 3 of raw wastewater; an undetermined volume of raw wastewater released into the Casco Bay Portland, U.S.A. after an electricity failure and the malfunction of backup generators; and approximately a 140,000 m 3 release of raw wastewater in 2020 during a WWTP failure in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. [ 10 , 11 ]. In 2018, in Poland, there were emergency discharges of raw sewage into the Motława River, which then went into the Gulf of Gdańsk, Poland.…”

“…It is estimated that approximately 72% of all WWTP accidents occur due to a combination of those reasons. Thus, due to the changing climate and extreme weather conditions occurring more commonly, it is estimated that the number of WWTP failures will continue to increase in the future [ 11 ].…”

Quantifying climate risks to infrastructure systems: A comparative review of developments across infrastructure sectors

“…While an increasing number of studies are focused on quantifying higher Tier impacts (two to four), these are still relatively scarce in the literature. In addition, infrastructure disruptions can cause a range of impacts that are often not quantified, such as injury or PLOS CLIMATE mortality associated with accidents during hazard impact to infrastructure, increases in travel time (and the economic loss associated with that) [127], environmental impacts (e.g., due to failure of wastewater treatment plant) [128], or social unrest (e.g., during large blackout events) [129]. Hence, quantifying a wider set of impacts helps in assessing the wider tangible and intangible impacts that infrastructure disruptions may cause, which would strengthen the business case for improving the resilience of infrastructure systems.…”