Municipal wastewater treatment in China: Development history and future perspectives

Highlights

The history of China’s municipal wastewater management is revisited.

The remaining challenges in wastewater sector in China are identified.

New concept municipal wastewater treatment plants are highlighted.

An integrated plant of energy, water and fertilizer recovery is envisaged.

Abstract

China has the world’s largest and still growing wastewater sector and water market, thus its future development will have profound influence on the world. The high-speed development of China’s wastewater sector over the past 40 years has forged its global leading treatment capacity and innovation ability. However, many problems were left behind, including underdeveloped sewers and sludge disposal facilities, low sustainability of the treatment processes, questionable wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) effluent discharge standards, and lacking global thinking on harmonious development between wastewater management, human society and the nature. Addressing these challenges calls for fundamental changes in target design, policy and technologies. In this mini-review, we revisit the development history of China’s municipal wastewater management and identify the remaining challenges. Also, we highlight the future needs of sustainable development and exploring China’s own wastewater management path, and outlook the future from several aspects including targets of wastewater management, policies and technologies, especially the new concept WWTP. Furthermore, we envisage the establishment of new-generation WWTPs with the vision of turning WWTP from a site of pollutant removal into a plant of energy, water and fertilizer recovery and an integrated part urban ecology in China.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

China / Wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) / Process / Management / Policy / New Concept WWTP

References

[1] Brundtland G H (1987). Our Common Future—The Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development. Oxford: Oxford University Press

[2] Hansen M H, Li H, Svarverud R (2018). Ecological civilization: Interpreting the Chinese past, projecting the global future. Global Environmental Change, 53: 195–203

[3] Hao X, Batstone D, Guest J S (2015). Carbon neutrality: An ultimate goal towards sustainable wastewater treatment plants. Water Research, 87: 413–415

[4] Jin L, Zhang G, Tian H (2014). Current state of sewage treatment in China. Water Research, 66: 85–98

[5] Li W W, Yu H Q (2016). Advances in energy-producing anaerobic biotechnologies for municipal wastewater treatment. Engineering, 2(4): 438–446

[6] Li W W, Yu H Q, He Z (2014). Towards sustainable wastewater treatment by using microbial fuel cells-centered technologies. Energy & Environmental Science, 7(3): 911–924

[7] Li W W, Yu H Q, Rittmann B E (2015). Chemistry: Reuse water pollutants. Nature, 528(7580): 29–31

[8] Lu L, Guest J S, Peters C A, Zhu X, Rau G H, Ren Z J (2018). Wastewater treatment for carbon capture and utilization. Nature Sustainability, 1(12): 750–758

[9] Lu Y, Song S, Wang R, Liu Z, Meng J, Sweetman A J, Jenkins A, Ferrier R C, Li H, Luo W, Wang T (2015). Impacts of soil and water pollution on food safety and health risks in China. Environment International, 77: 5–15

[10] McCarty P L, Bae J, Kim J (2011). Domestic wastewater treatment as a net energy producer—Can this be achieved? Environmental Science & Technology, 45(17): 7100–7106

[11] Qu J H, Wang H C, Wang K J, Yu G, Ke B, Yu H Q (2014). Constrctuion of new concept wastewater treatment plants in China. China Environmental News, 14 Dec., 2014 (in Chinese)

[12] Schnoor J L (2009). NEWater future? Environmental Science & Technology, 43(17): 6441–6442

[13] Shannon M A, Bohn P W, Elimelech M, Georgiadis J G, Mariñas B J, Mayes A M (2008). Science and technology for water purification in the coming decades. Nature, 452(7185): 301–310

[14] The State Council (2016). The 13th Five-Year Plan for the Construction of Urban Sewage Treatment and Recycling Facilities. Beijing: The State Council of the People’s Republic of China (in Chinese)

[15] van Loosdrecht M C, Brdjanovic D (2014). Anticipating the next century of wastewater treatment. Science, 344(6191): 1452–1453

[16] Verstraete W, Van de Caveye P, Diamantis V (2009). Maximum use of resources present in domestic “used water”. Bioresource Technology, 100(23): 5537–5545

[17] Wang M, Gong H (2018a). Imbalanced development and economic burden for urban and rural wastewater treatment in China—discharge limit legislation. Sustainability, 10(8): 2597

[18] Wang M, Gong H (2018b). Not-in-my-backyard: Legislation requirements and economic analysis for developing underground wastewater treatment plant in China. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 15(11): 2339

[19] Yu C, Huang X, Chen H, Godfray H C J, Wright J S, Hall J W, Gong P, Ni S, Qiao S, Huang G, Xiao Y, Zhang J, Feng Z, Ju X, Ciais P, Stenseth N C, Hessen D O, Sun Z, Yu L, Cai W, Fu H, Huang X, Zhang C, Liu H, Taylor J (2019). Managing nitrogen to restore water quality in China. Nature, 567(7749): 516–520

[20] Zhang Q H, Yang W N, Ngo H H, Guo W S, Jin P K, Dzakpasu M, Yang S J, Wang Q, Wang X C, Ao D (2016). Current status of urban wastewater treatment plants in China. Environment International, 92–93: 11–22

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the CSD (Beijing) Environmental Protection Development Co. and the Secretariat of Expert Committee for China’s Concept WWTPs for supporting this work.

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

2019 Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature