Hi there Detlef, Marijn and friends,

I've missed this post late last year and found it now that I'm researching a bit on the topic of decentralised WWTP and nutrient recovery. I'm delighted to read on nutrient recovery and energy production being applied to systems across the Netherlands. I'm a member of a Brazilian NGO that has been working on this field for over 20 years, and that has been depicted at this short video also produced by Ellen MacArthur Foundation:

Katja Hansen and the Biological Nutrient Metabolism

I highly recommend it to everyone interested in Cradle to Cradle, EcoSan, and the "Energie Fabrik" concept.

Despite being a completely different climate, where we see greater advantage on the production of biomass (i.e. aquatic plants) through the use of nutrients already present on wastewater, rather than producing fertilisers in chemical and highly energy-intensive processes, it's still worth a view as it presents sanitation and biological cycle side-by-side, within a C2C perspective.

Now, I'm researching on the issue of centralised vs. decentralised WWTP's. I am from Sao Paulo (Brazil), a large metropolis with nearly 18 million inhabitants and only 5 WWTP's. The largest of them treats 4.5 Mi p.e., and a large share of the city does have collection, but all of it is disposed in local creeks that ultimately lead to Tiete, the city's largest river. It seems obvious to me that being a densely populated city, where space and financial resources are limited, that the city should instead decentralise treatment to small regions, whether neighborhoods or microbasins. So are there any major cities that count with dozens (if not hundreds) of WWTP's across its area, and still have one company or agency overlooking its operation?

Best regards from Sao Paulo, Brazil,

Thanks Mariska,

Eva Gladek put it right, it is all about going for Circular Economy, lucking for system orientated solutions. In my opinion, the beloved sustainable sanitation aka ecosan is just and only a small part of it and should not end up as an "unusual" object orientated solution.

Detlef

Dear all,

Just finished watching a super interesting tv documentary on more sustainable water and wastewater management. Most is in Dutch, but the parts on an ecological neighborhood in Amsterdam is in English, as well as an interview with a Hungarian gentleman introducing Organica (was new to me - looks great!), and a visit to our "own" zenrainman!!

tegenlicht.vpro.nl/afleveringen/2013-201...racht-van-water.html

Really nice. I'll see if they will allow me to add English subtitles.

All the best,
Mariska

With reference to the urine collection, I understand from the media that this was an experiment in Amsterdam durig a festival. On festival areas, including streets, the municipality commonly places portable urinals to minimize wild urinating by heavy beer drinkers. Since Struvite production is developing in The Netherlands, they recycled the content of these portable urinals; it was not collected from the common sewage system.

The Dutch waterboards are (among others) trying to keep the surface water clean from fosphates from excess fertilizer use. One element which has not been resolved is the annual cattle and pigsty farm waste, which is commonly stored in large silos (500- 1000 m3 each) during the winter and plowed into the fields during the spring. This ofcourse generates massive amounts of methane during the storage period and water pollution in the spring (and smells). I noted that the government actually subsidizes these farmbased waste storage facilities, rather than subsidizing biogas production.

From the thousands of livestock farms, the daily biogas can be burned off by electric power generators and fed into the grid on demand, eventually remote controlled, swithching them on for peak hours. It will greatly reduce methane or CO2 emissions, produce energy and avoid water pollution or country wide smells. In addition, by redesigning the stable floors you may be able to capture most of the urine separately and produce Struvite.
There is still a lot to be done.

Dear all,

Herewith a short reply from Henry van Velthuizen, who works on the projects in the Netherlands with regard to my earlier summary of their work.

Dear Mr. Zandee,

Thank you for your interest in our work. I read your summary of our projects. A few remarks. You are right that we focus on the centralised approach because we are a densely populated area, but in the Netherlands we are also in discussion with other organisations, especially Leaf (who are also part of the Susana network) about centralised vs. Decentralised. I forwarded your request to my colleagues.

Kind regards,


Henry van Veldhuizen


Strategic Advisor Watercycle

some exchange with the Strategic adviser of this group of 15 Dutch water boards:

Gesendet: Freitag, 29. November 2013 um 10:40 Uhr
Von: "Veldhuizen, Henry van" <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
An: "'Detlef Schwager'" <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Betreff: RE: OMZET - Waste water treatment as energy and mineral recovery utility- Net energy producers rather than consumers?

Dear Detlef Schwager,

Our technological approach is:

1. Less energy consumption for waste water treatment processes (aeration, pumps, anammox process for centrate)

2. More biogas production by hydrolysis

3. Higher conversion efficiency from biogas to electricity (biogas filtration, new CHP’s)

4. Converting excess sludge to a fuel by drying the sludge with excess heat of CHP (future)

We already realized number 1 and 3. Biogas filtration, increasing the self-sufficiency from 30% in 2006 to more than 55% nowadays

We plan to realize number 2 and 3 in 2014/2015 increasing the self-sufficiency for Amersfoort to 130%, but including the sludge of three other little wwtp’s. However the self sufficiency for the 4 wwtp’s together will be more than 70%.

With realizing 4 in the future we will go up to 105% for the 4 wwtp’s. From 2014-2016 we will perform a pilot installation for sludge drying with excess heat for 10% of the sludge. After that we hope to realize it on full scale.

So, you are right, it is still AS+AD, but in an optimized way.

I also add a recent presentation about the project for more information.

I hope I answered your questions, but do not hesitate to ask me again.

Kind regards,

Henry van Veldhuizen

Strategic Advisor Watercycle
+ 31 6 50 67 69 65
Waterschap Vallei en Veluwe
Steenbokstraat 10 | Apeldoorn
P.O. Box 4142 | 7320 AC Apeldoorn
The Netherlands
+ 31 55 527 29 11




Van: Detlef Schwager [This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.]
Verzonden: vrijdag 29 november 2013 9:41
Aan: Veldhuizen, Henry van
Onderwerp: OMZET - Waste water treatment as energy and mineral recovery utility- Net energy producers rather than consumers?

Dear Henry VAN VELDHUIZEN,

I am not sure I did understand the energiefabriek-project very well.

ec.europa.eu/environment/life/project/Pr...pPage&n_proj_id=4007

Unfortunately I did not understand your nice Dutch webpage very much. May I have some just energy related questions to you.

What is your new technological approach that will make your wwtp's real net energy producers rather than consumers?

Because, as fare I understand your short English description, photo of wwtp and your video, you still use very common wwtp systems based on "AS + AD", which means you have an energy efficiency but still consuming AS, producing secondary sludge and an improved energy producing AD, using secondary sludge. Correct?

As it is stated in general textbooks, AS needs in general 1 kWh/m3 and waste water have in general a chemical Energy content of more or less 1,5 kWh/m3. Having excluded all the energy loses during all the waste water processing, a common wwtp may "run" autark on energy by it self. If you would like to be a net energy producers you must do co-fermentation in your by hydrolysis improved AD. In other words you have to bring in the system other chemical energy content, which means the wwtp is not a net energy producer in reality.

Or do you start maybe straight with energy producing AD (like UASB or ABR) with less sludge and having afterwards "only" a smaller AS to treat the water to standard, having savings probably via less energy usage and less sludge volumes? Is "AD+AS" probably your new technological approach?

Kindly advice.

Best Regards,

Detlef SCHWAGER
MSc. Tropical Water Engineering

Please find attached an informal overview about ongoing "NEW" Dutch wwtp-developments, aiming for "Energy Factories & Resource Factories" ("green" decentralized gas-works+CHP's) in 2030 by "re-using" their existing old centralized wwtp's: forum.susana.org/forum/categories?func=v...6755&limit=1000#6772

The Dutch call it "NEW WATER", "NEW" stays for Nutrients-Resources + Energy + Water, see more about in presentation.

All this "NEW" country wide developments since 2008! have heavy EU-fundings involved.

The most detailed presentation on the topics involved is the Large Prezi-Presentation about Dutch "Energiefabriek & Grondstoffenfabriek"
prezi.com/ertmevgmoen0/copy-of-energiefa...rondstoffenfabriek/#

Where are our country wide (Germany) visions for 2030? Our developing DWA-NASS-standards will do it too?

Happy X-mass and Happy New Year

Detlef SCHWAGER

and
#6774

...Regarding Dutch water-based sanitation technology, I'm very skeptical about the use of anammox bacteria in sewage treatment from a health standpoint.
www.tudelft.nl/en/current/latest-news/ar...et-anammox-bacterie/

Do we really want to add this type of bacteria to our bodies when it's known to produce rocket fuel?
news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/11...1109_rocketfuel.html

Water-based sanitation needs to come to an end. The most recent frightening issue in the news is antibiotic resistant superbugs found in China's wastewater, NDM-1, something previously known in India:
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131216142807.htm
f1000.com/posters/browse/summary/1094298
www.facebook.com/keith.bell.1428

#6776

Dear Keith,

May you explain the mentioned health problems with "...anammox bacteria in sewage treatment from a health standpoint." I am not an expert on that.

Thanks in advance.

Happy X-mas & Happy New Year
Detlef

and
24 Dec 2013 06:21 #6789

Dear Keith,

As Detlef, I would also like to know if you have any more information on the health risks of annamox. I would not consider myself an expert, but I did work on the annamox process a little. Considering that this technology is researched and piloted in two very safety conscious countries (The Netherlands and Switzerland) I would be very surprised if there was a serious public health issue that was not addressed. Further, annamox bacteria do exist in nature, but are hard to cultivate because they require a very specific environment. For example they are very sensitive to oxygen. So I don't think they would proliferate outside the reactors at the WWTPs.

Further, I think that the statement that water based sanitation must end is not particularly helpful. There are problems with it, but it has also brought enormous health benefits. I am a horses for courses type of thinker and I think that in places where there is no very big lack of water, water based sanitation may be a very good idea, much depends on the local conditions. If the researchers in the Netherlands can recover nutrients, raw materials and energy in a centralized process in an economically viable way, this may be a very big and positive breakthrough in how we deal with waste.

Finally, yes the multi-resistant bacteria are a huge concern. I live in Nepal and visit China and India, so if anyone should be scared it is me . I do not however think that blaming the existence of these multi-resistant bacteria on water based sanitation is correct. This has much more to do with the indiscriminate use of antibiotics. For example: people do not finish their prescribed courses, use the wrong medicine for their ailments, etc. This is also true for the veterinary use of antibiotics. I am not sure if outlawing water based sanitation would bring a halt to the spread of such bacteria.

Kind regards

Marijn Zandee
Technical Advisor
Nepal Biogas Promotion Association (NBPA)

Deutsche Gesellschaft für
Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH
Kathmandu, Nepal

E: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
I: www.nbp-association.org

(note by moderator (EvM): this post was moved to here from this thread: forum.susana.org/forum/categories/34-uri...on-really-the-future)

Dear all,

To come back to the projects of the Dutch water boards.

It was very interesting for me to read that while I am out in Nepal working on these subjects, they are taking it to scale in my home country! I think thus far their efforts have also not generated too much media attention in the Netherlands.

I have spent some time going through their presentations and websites and have come to the following rough overview of the programs that I would like to share with you (some of it will be somewhat redundant if you have also read Detlef's post above) . I hope I represent their ideas correctly here.

First of all, these water boards are a layer of government, they are responsible for pretty much all water management (Apart from keeping out the sea). Without them a lot of the Netherlands would turn into a swamp, waste water treatment is only part of their mandate.

Their vision seems to be to try and recover as much energy and nutrients/raw materials from the waste water streams that they receive (as long as it economically viable, eg makes them money). Their whole model is based on centralized treatment and I do not see any indication that they are thinking about changing this. Personally, I think there could be a strong case to argue that in case of densely populated areas, with an existing sewage system, central treatment and energy/nutrient recovery could be more efficient than going de-centralized.

It seems that the first thing they started on was biogas production from sewage sludge, they expect that when this process is optimized their WWTPs can actually produce a significant amount of energy (sell about as much energy as they are currently buying). At the current time it seems there are about 12 of these "energy factories" operational or under construction. Some of these WWTPs are now more or less energy neutral.

Secondly they started looking into recovering nutrients and or fibers (cellulose). As raw materials for other industries. There are some struvite production facilities in operation (to reclaim phosphate). It seems there are some experiments going on with reclaiming Nitrogen compounds as well, but I could not find much on this. Annamox is being used for ammonium and nitrate reductions, as far as I know this process this will not lead to a recoverable nitrogen form, but reduce the energy needs of the WWTPs.
Cellulose recovery also seems to be in a full scale pilot phase. And one WWTP seems to filter the water they recover with RO technology and sell it as ultra clean processing water to industries.

One interesting point that is made is that if nutrients and raw materials can be recovered, this is likely to make generate much more income then when energy is produced from the same waste. Therefore they may decide to reduce the production of biogas in favor of recovering for example cellulose or algae as raw materials.

In general, I think they are realizing that they need a flexible range of technologies, which have different energy/nutrient recover modules that can be used in different locations based on local waste water composition and local value chains for the raw materials that they can recover/produce. At this point in time I think they are now trialling a number of their technologies in various locations (at full scale), lobbying for changes in government regulations where necessary and researching value chains.

I will try to invite them to this forum so that they can join the discussion.

Happy holidays

Marijn Zandee

Note by moderator: The post was moved to here into a new thread. It is referring to this post:
forum.susana.org/forum/categories/34-uri...ally-the-future#6769


Dear Elisabeth,

I am surprised about you, as you been at UNESCO-IHE more or less a former insider of Dutch water-sanitation developments

...they collected urine in Amsterdam: this was really interesting for me. I couldn't figure out exactly who was behind it (a certain water board) and whether this was just a one off promotional thing or if this is a longer-term project. Very interesting. I wish our Dutch colleagues would keep us more informed about what is happening in the Netherlands on these urine recovery activities...?

May I add my very subjective observations as an outsider on "Dutch topics".
On the so called "high-end areas" of water-sanitation on very centralized systems, in my opinion the Dutch try to make out of the huge disadvantages of centralized systems much as possibly advantages to recover in collected waste water contented chemical energy and raw materials. Keeping in mind, the NL do not have much raw materials in their natural underground like other European countries. They will have to rely more and more on what they have collected and recovered.

In my subjective opinion, they try to move trough long-term goals (by 2030) on the so called "ecosan aka NASS" out of niche corners towards profit making businesses "goldmine", what is maybe one of the reason on their purposely "quietness"!

see
- www.grondstoffabriek.com/english/
and
- energiefabriek.com/english

at energiefabriek.com/deutsch ...Damit hat die Projektgruppe ein Konzept gefunden, dass für die landesweite Einführung gut geeignet ist. Und sobald dieses Konzept einträglich ist, kann der Bürger davon mitprofitieren!

which is very different to current neo-liberal "German" approaches: Profit to some private accounts & Losses to the general public via PPP.

see online: 1/2 h lecture 16. The Resource Factory by ir. Charlotte van Erp Taalman Kip of Waterschap Hollandse Delta. She gives her view on the resource factory. ocw.tudelft.nl/courses/watermanagement/w...he-resource-factory/
and PDF
How to turn waste water into a goldmine:


As the existing centralized systems and wwtp have to be used to the end of their live time to recover made long-term investment costs, it will take a long time to change from energy consuming wwtp's towards energy- and raw-material producing factories (gas-works). It is just starting with making e.g. old AS-technologies more "energy-efficiency", moving still with old AS-technologies via more or less "energy-autarky" towards decentralized "energy- and raw-material producers using then more AD-technologies", but still using existing centralized collection systems.

To do so the Dutch Water Boards (public utilities) a bit similar to German AZV's (for outsiders: communal owned companies between some towns) making use of Dutch subventions and many EU-fundings, see e.g. a very big R&D-consortium, in the past and ongoing inners.eu/ 2010-2014, an EU-program for possible energy efficiency & autarky for "old" AS-wwtp's.

Large Prezi-Presentation about Dutch "Energiefabriek & Grondstoffenfabriek"

Find attached a presentation by Mr. Coert PETRI held in Germany in 2011 1/2 German & English and in Dutch.

We are building the first 12 Energiefabrieken in the Netherlands and are now also aiming at the recovery of cellulose, phosphate etc. from the waste water.

I hope this helps to understand the nice Dutch developments a bit more.

All the Best & Frohe Weihnachten und ein Gutes Neues Jahr

Detlef