Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering , University of California , Irvine , California 92697-2175 , United States.
Water-Energy Nexus Center , University of California , Irvine , California 92697-2175 , United States.
Environ Sci Technol. 2018 Aug 7;52(15):8965-8976. doi: 10.1021/acs.est.8b01623. Epub 2018 Jul 17.
The existing wastewater treatment infrastructure has not adequately established an efficient and sustainable use of energy, water, and nutrients. A proposed scheme based on source separation and water-efficient use is compared to the current wastewater management paradigm (one largely based on activated sludge) using techno-economic terms. This paper explores the economic viability of adopting more sustainable management alternatives and expands the understanding of the economics of decentralization and source-separation. The feasibility of three different potential types of source-separation (with different levels of decentralization) are compared to the conventional centralized activated sludge process by using recognized economic assessment methodologies together with widely accepted modeling tools. The alternatives were evaluated for two common scenarios: new developments and retrofit due to the aging of existing infrastructures. The results prove that source-separated alternatives can be competitive options despite existing drawbacks (only when countable incomes are included), while the hybrid approach resulted in the least cost-effective solution. A detailed techno-economic evaluation of the costs of decentralization provides insight into the current constraints concerning the paradigm shift and the cost of existing technologic inertia.
现有的废水处理基础设施未能有效地利用能源、水和营养物质。本文提出了一种基于源头分离和节水的方案，并从技术经济角度与当前的废水管理模式（主要基于活性污泥）进行了比较。本文探讨了采用更可持续的管理替代方案的经济可行性，并扩展了对分散化和源头分离经济学的理解。使用公认的经济评估方法和广泛接受的建模工具，本文比较了三种不同潜在类型的源头分离（具有不同程度的分散化）与传统的集中式活性污泥工艺相比的可行性。通过评估两种常见情景（新开发和由于现有基础设施老化而进行的改造）来评估替代方案。结果表明，尽管存在缺陷（仅在计入可计数收入的情况下），但源头分离的替代方案可能是具有竞争力的选择，而混合方法则导致成本效益最低的解决方案。对分散化成本的详细技术经济评估深入了解了范式转变和现有技术惯性成本的当前限制。
