Decentralized Water and Wastewater Reuse


Water, an essential element to all life, is a globally scarce natural resource. One in three people around the world does not have enough water to meet their daily needs (WHO, 2009). Water crises will become increasingly worse tomorrow, compared to today, as a result of population growth, exponential growing urbanization, changes in human life styles, industrial development and climate change induced drought.

Treating and reusing water for provision of non-potable water supply and conservation of high valued drinking water usage can be an excellent strategy to overcome this life threatening water scare situation, where demand extensively exceeds supplies.

In the United States of America approximately 155 x106 cubic meters per day of treated wastewater were released from publicly owned wastewater treatment facilities in 1995 (Asano, et. al., 2007) and only 2% of the treated wastewater was reclaimed for beneficial uses such as irrigation of public parks and golf courses. According to the WateReuse Association, however, the national reclaimed water use rate has increased by 15% each year resulting in approximately 2.6 x103 million gallon of reclaimed water currently being reused per day (Asano et. al., 2007).

In the United States of America approximately 155 x106 cubic meters per day of treated wastewater were released from publicly owned wastewater treatment facilities in 1995 (Asano, et. al., 2007) and only 2% of the treated wastewater was reclaimed for beneficial uses such as irrigation of public parks and golf courses. According to the WateReuse Association, however, the national reclaimed water use rate has increased by 15% each year resulting in approximately 2.6 x103 million gallon of reclaimed water currently being reused per day (Asano et. al., 2007).

But, most of the reuse technology currently developed and used in the United States occurs at centralized wastewater treatment plants (water reclamation facilities) at the large community-scale. Hence, there is the need to expand this effort to also include communities, businesses and households that are (1) either not served by these large regional centralized wastewater treatment plants or (2) in sewered areas that are not served by centralized reclaimed non-potable water supplies. Thus the focus here is upon decentralized reuse technology distributed throughout communities, in neighborhoods, at businesses and commercial facilities and even, in some cases, at individual homes.