Benchmarking tertiary water treatments for the removal of micropollutants and pathogens based on operational and sustainability criteria

In a context of increasing water scarcity, it is essential to ensure an integrated watershed management, savings in the consumption of water as a finite resource and improve the performance of wastewater treatment plants to guarantee the quality of treated effluents. Therefore, advanced technologies for tertiary wastewater treatment have been widely studied in recent decades. These treatments have been reviewed over the years mainly providing comparisons from a technical perspective. However, there is a lack of a holistic evaluation considering environmental and economic aspects together with the aforementioned technical aspects. In this review, treatment alternatives for micropollutant and pathogen abatement have been identified based on technologies implemented on a large scale (ozonation, ultraviolet treatment, adsorption on activated carbon or membrane filtration) as well as those treatments in the process of implementation, such as electrochemical, Fenton-based or photocatalytic techniques. Thus, a systematic bibliographic search was performed considering works applying pilot and full-scale equipment, leaving lab-scale results out of the analysis. The description of each process allowed the identification of the technical feasibility, operating costs and associated environmental impacts, providing a comparative assessment that will help decision-making in the development and application of the different technologies. The benchmarking results reveal that the selected treatment should be chosen based on the source and specific pollutants present in the wastewater, as there is no single solution for the treatment of micropollutants and pathogens. In addition, recommendations are presented for the publication of reliable process-related data to facilitate comparison between different technologies and treatment scenarios.

Automated summary

In the context of increasing water scarcity, it is crucial to ensure integrated watershed management, water conservation, and improved performance of wastewater treatment plants. Advanced technologies for tertiary wastewater treatment have been widely studied, but there is a lack of holistic evaluation considering technical, environmental, and economic aspects. This review identifies treatment alternatives for micropollutant and pathogen abatement based on large-scale technologies and those in the process of implementation. It provides a comparative assessment of technical feasibility, operating costs, and environmental impacts to aid decision-making.