Wastewater Refining Technologies and Modes Toward Ultimate Utilization of Wastewater Resource

The present municipal wastewater treatment processes possess problems such as high investment, high waste yield and low efficiency. A new concept of wastewater refining was proposed toward ultimate utilization of wastewater resource, and key technologies and possible pathways to realize the concept analyzed. The core concept of wastewater refining is considering wastewater as resource. By changing the present treatment principles of pollutants degradation and removal, safe and efficient utilization of water, organic matters and inorganic salts can be realized by fine separation and directional transformation of valuable materials in wastewater. Wastewater refining includes three key processes of separation, transformation and utilization. Based on the technical analysis, two technical pathways of ecological and high-end modes of wastewater refining were presented for different cases. In addition, wastewater refining technology was systematically analyzed. It is pointed that the safe and efficient utilization of reclaimed wastewater is the important driver for advancing wastewater refining technology, and combining wastewater reclamation with resource and energy transformation is the future developing direction.