Department of Construction Science, Texas A&M University, 3137 TAMU, College Station, Texas 77843, United States.
Department of Civil, Coastal and Environmental Engineering, University of South Alabama, 150 Student Services Drive, SHEC 3142, Mobile, Alabama 36688, United States.
Environ Sci Technol. 2024 Oct 22;58(42):18671-18685. doi: 10.1021/acs.est.4c01170. Epub 2024 Oct 9.
Despite global efforts on meeting sustainable development goals by 2030, persistent and widespread sanitation deficits in rural, underserved communities in high-income countries─including the United States (US)─challenge achieving this target. The recent US federal infrastructure funding, coupled with research efforts to explore innovative, alternative decentralized wastewater systems, are unprecedented opportunities for addressing basic sanitation gaps in these communities. Yet, understanding how to best manage these systems for sustainable operations and maintenance (O&M) is still a national need. Here, we develop an integrated management approach for achieving such sustainable systems, taking into account the utility structure, operational aspects, and possible barriers impeding effective management of decentralized wastewater infrastructure. We demonstrate this approach through a binomial logistic regression of survey responses from 114 public and private management entities (e.g., water and sewer utilities) operating in 27 states in the US, targeting the rural Alabama Black Belt wastewater issues. Our assessment introduces policy areas that support sustainable decentralized wastewater systems management and operations, including privatizing water-wastewater infrastructure systems, incentivizing/mandating the consolidation of utility management of these systems, federally funding the O&M, and developing and retaining water-wastewater workforce in rural, underserved communities. Our discussions give rise to a holistic empirical understanding of effective management of decentralized wastewater infrastructure for rural, underserved communities in the US, thereby contributing to global conversations on sustainable development.
尽管全球各国都在努力实现 2030 年可持续发展目标，但在高收入国家（包括美国）的农村和服务不足社区，持续存在且广泛存在的卫生设施不足问题，对实现这一目标构成了挑战。最近美国联邦基础设施资金的投入，加上探索创新的、替代的分散式废水处理系统的研究工作，为解决这些社区的基本卫生设施差距提供了前所未有的机会。然而，了解如何最好地管理这些系统以实现可持续运营和维护（O&M）仍然是一个国家的需求。在这里，我们开发了一种综合管理方法，以实现这种可持续系统，同时考虑到公共事业结构、运营方面以及可能阻碍分散式废水基础设施有效管理的障碍。我们通过对美国 27 个州的 114 个公共和私人管理实体（例如，水和污水公用事业）的调查回复进行二项逻辑回归，展示了这种方法，针对的是阿拉巴马州黑人区的农村废水问题。我们的评估引入了支持可持续分散式废水系统管理和运营的政策领域，包括将水-污水基础设施系统私有化、激励/要求这些系统的公共事业管理整合、联邦资助 O&M 以及在农村和服务不足社区发展和留住水-污水劳动力。我们的讨论提出了对美国农村和服务不足社区分散式废水基础设施有效管理的整体经验理解，从而为全球可持续发展对话做出了贡献。
