Focus 2011 Investments–Infrastructures–Technological Innovation
RECOVERY AND REUSE OF WASTE WATER
It is well known that the availability of water resources in many countries, even with humid, temperate climates, is already at critical levels and that a worsening of the situation is foreseen for the future due to both climate change - with a reduction in average rainfall - and a substantial increase in the demand for good-quality water. Quite often, even in countries with high rainfall, demand for water exceeds the supply and traditional means of supplying are possible only at progressively higher costs.
On the other hand, in recent years greater attention to the environment has favoured legislation with increasingly strict discharge limits. Consequently, substantial economic resources have been invested in removal of pollutants from water, resulting in many cases in good-quality purified water. Thus, a growing awareness exists that using water only once before returning it to its natural cycle is quite unreasonable.
Though direct treatment of wastewater for purposes of drinking water is currently limited to very particular local conditions, significant progress has been made in the reuse of water for agriculture and a growing number of industrial processes. Even indirect reuse for drinking water purposes such as the refilling of ground water has gained consensus, even if some worries still remain with regard to the presence of traces of organic compounds, the reliability over time of the efficiency of purification treatment, and especially of the users’ psychological reservations.
These and other aspects will make up the topics for interesting debates to be held in the Congress Sessions. In greater detail, the in-depth studies will look at:
- Analysis of risks associated with presence of traces of contaminants
- Microbiological quality monitoring techniques
- Optimization of the stages of purification treatment
- New disinfection techniques
- Problems related to water storage
- Where chemical and biological contaminants end up
- Long-term sustainability and ground/aquifer interaction
Much attention will also be reserved to problems related to the planning of provisioning which increasingly requires more involvement on the part of administrators with managerial competence. In particular, two aspects of the complex planning process merit particular attention: if the level of purification treatment of disposal water meets the qualitative needs of possible users (and in the negative case, provide integrative purification treatments) and how to cope with demand variability (storage of treated water or integration with fresh water). |
