DETERMINATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE OF ADVANCEDTREATMENT ALTERNATIVES IN BIOLOGICAL WASTEWATER TREATMENTPLANTS BY LIFE CYCLE ANALYSIS

Atabay Ö., Çankaya S.

14. INTERNATIONAL MARMARA SCIENCES CONGRESS, Kocaeli, Türkiye, 16 - 17 Mayıs 2025, ss.64, (Özet Bildiri)

  • Yayın Türü: Bildiri / Özet Bildiri
  • Basıldığı Şehir: Kocaeli
  • Basıldığı Ülke: Türkiye
  • Sayfa Sayıları: ss.64
  • Kocaeli Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet

Özet

Wastewater treatment plants play a critical role in protecting water resources and ensuring environmentalsustainability. Although conventional biological treatment processes are effective in removing organicpollutants, advanced treatment technologies are needed to completely remove some pollutants and reusetreated water. However, these activities affect the environmental sustainability of existing facilities due toadditional resource consumption (water, electricity, chemicals, etc.). Impact categories such as globalwarming potential, embedded energy and eutrophication potential are among the main environmentalsustainability impact categories of wastewater management and resource recovery strategies. In this study,the carbon footprint of a biological wastewater treatment plant was determined with a life cycle approachand comparative evaluations were made by creating advanced treatment scenarios.Three scenarios weredeveloped for the evaluation of advanced treatment alternatives: (S1) Nanofiltration + UVC, (S2) Sandfiltration + UVC, and (S3) Ozonation. Carbon footprint is an indicator of global warming potential (GWP)in life cycle assessment. SimaPro 9.6 software and “IPCC 2021 GWP 100” impact assessment method wereused in the study. According to the results of the impact assessment, the global warming potential (GWP)resulting from the treatment of 1 m3 wastewater in the biological wastewater treatment plant for the currentsituation was determined as 0.54 kg CO2 equivalent. The global warming potentials for S1, S2, and S3 werefound to be 1.09 kg CO2-eq., 0.48 kg CO2-eq., and 0.39 kg CO2-eq., respectively. The present studycontributes to the identification of the most suitable advanced treatment alternatives in terms ofsustainability in biological wastewater treatment plants. The detailed analysis of the environmentalperformance provides important data for the future development of treatment technologies with lowerenvironmental impact. Furthermore, such analyses can help shape water management policies andimplement new technologies that minimize environmental impacts. This study contributes to theidentification of the most suitable advanced treatment alternatives in terms of sustainability in biologicalwastewater treatment plants.