The Importance of Optimizing Energy Consumption in Wastewater Treatment Plants- A Case Study of East Mashhad Wastewater Treatment Plant

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Professor, school of Environment, college of engineering, university of Tehran, Tehran, Iran

2 PhD student , school of Environment, college of engineering, university of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

Construction of wastewater treatment plant, if energy and water resources are recovered, can justify some undesirable effects such as greenhouse gas emissions. sludge management and treatment is one of  the most complex and costly parts of  treatment  plants  that can cover  up  to  60%  of  initial capital  and  operation  costs of  a  wastewater  treatment  plant. Considering the importance of reducing energy consumption in wastewater treatment plants as an environmental  and  economic  point  of  view,  some investigations  have  done  to construct and modify wastewater plants worldwide in order to the self-sufficiency of energy supply recently year. This article is a practical study that the costs of capital and energy consumption were analyzed in comparison with other processes for MLE1 process with aerobic digestion in wastewater treatment plant in east of Mashhad with flow rate of 80000 m3/d. The results show that energy consumption in this system is about 2 times of similar wastewater treatment plants with optimal process. Also, however, the energy level will decrease from 1 kwh/m3 to 0.58 kwh/m3 with the change of aerobic digestion to anaerobic, but it is necessary to use of CHP system for decrease of energy consumption and recovery in comparison with constructed or optimized of wastewater treatment plants in worldwide. Therefore, it is necessary to pay more attention in selecting the process of liquid and sludge section in wastewater treatment plants under studying or optimizing wastewater treatment plants built in the country because of the numerous benefits of reducing energy consumption in wastewater treatment plants, in order to be self-sufficient in energy supply.

Keywords

References

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Journal of Water and Wastewater Science and Engineering
Volume 5, Issue 4
January 2021
Pages 41-52

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History

  • Receive Date: 19 February 2020
  • Revise Date: 16 August 2020
  • Accept Date: 06 September 2020

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