- Emma Tomren, WorleyParsons; Dr Martin Anda & Prof Goen Ho, Murdoch University
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In the midst of the current water crisis in Australia, a transition towards decentralising treatment of wastewater gives opportunity for a more sustainable water cycle with localised reuse of water and nutrients.
Lack of expertise regarding different decentralised wastewater technologies is a major problem with hundreds of technologies being commercially available globally and dozens locally. This is further complicated with wide variance in the energy efficiency, maintenance requirements and nutrient management capabilities of individual units. Therefore selection of appropriate technology is complicated.
To address this problem a number of decision support tools have been developed to assist in determining what treatment type would be appropriate in a given situation. Key selection factors addressed by these tools include land area available, financial constraints, combination of technologies, health and environmental risk and scale of collection.
While extensive information regarding the regulatory factors affecting decentralised wastewater technologies has been dealt with in former decision support tools, there is room for further development related to maintenance requirements, nutrient management and energy efficiency. This paper presents a recent development at the Environmental Technology Centre, Murdoch University of an algorithm for appropriate decentralised wastewater selection with a focus on nutrient management and energy efficiency of different treatment and technologies. Electronic adaptation of the algorithm into an automated form is presented that allows for application of the tool to a large number of wastewater situations beyond the urban. These include national parks, remote townships, mining camps, peri-urban areas and aboriginal communities.
BIOS:
Emma Tomren has completed a Bachelor of Science in Conservation Biology and a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science with Honours at Murdoch University, Western Australia. She undertook her Honours project in 2008, working as part of the research group at Murdoch University’s Environmental Technology Centre. The focus of the project was appropriate technology selection of decentralized wastewater treatment and recycling systems for remote tourist areas, with project sponsorship from the Department of Environment and Conservation. This project involved the development of an electronic decision support tool for decentralized wastewater treatment and recycling systems, taking into account factors such as energy efficiency, nutrient removal and maintenance requirements of the individual systems.
Emma is currently employed by WorleyParsons Ltd in the Water & Wastewater group.
Dr Martin Anda is a senior lecturer at Murdoch University. His areas of expertise include liquid waste recycling, solid waste recycling, energy efficiency in buildings, sustainable development, governance and environmental technology in Australian Indigenous communities. Dr Anda was the main supervisor of this research project.
Prof Goen Ho also lectures at Murdoch University. His areas of expertise include waste management, pollution control and environmental technologies, particularly those which achieve sustainable development. Prof Ho also supervised this research work.