Green Options

Veteran solar installer Parkson Corporation is lending its expertise to a new wastewater treatment plant upgrade for the town of Berlin near the Maryland coast.  When it’s finished, the new plant will almost eliminate the use of fossil fuels for drying and converting biosolids, also known as sludge, into a lightweight Class A soil amendment or sustainable fuel.  The process is pushed along by a stainless steel “Electric Mole” that automaticaly mixes, aerates, and granulates the sludge as it dries.

The $16 million upgrade project is funded by ARRA (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act).  Parkson’s Thermo-System Active Solar Sludge Drying Chambers will enable the sludge conversion process to operate under more than 90% solar power rather than using gas or oil.  For disposing sludge in landfills, that translates into a significant savings in preparation and transportation costs.  Even better, it makes sludge products more cost-competitive with conventional soil amendments and fossil fuels, effectively taking the “waste” out of wastewater.

Researchers from the University of Massachusetts Amherst evolved a new strain of the Geobacter microbe that increases power output per cell by 800%.

The hairy mud-loving microbe uses its hairlike filaments–called pili–to produce an electric current from both mud and waste water. The pili are only 5 nanometers in diameter (20,000 times smaller than a human hair); they’re also a thousand times longer than they are wide. But they are strong!

When municipalities look to cut costs, some of the first programs that get chopped are green programs. But, is that such a good idea? Municipal green programs can have significant economic benefits in addition to their environmental bona fides.

The biggest commodities boom of the 20th century was a bust for water and wastewater utilities, which found themselves locked in a battle with manufacturers for vital water treatment chemicals over the past five years.  Competition for more chemicals to grow biofuel crops didn’t help, either.  Prices for some chemicals almost tripled between 2003 and 2008 as utilities scrambled to find scarce supplies.  Though the global recession helped to ease the price and supply issues, the next boom cycle could bring things to a boiling point.  Fortunately, more sustainable non-chemical water treatment methods are on the horizon and could play a role in stabilizing the situation over the long run.

Midcromidas, Inc. has turned its green eye on wastewater, and it is seeing gold.  The company has developed a strain of microbes that can convert the carbon in wastewater into PHA (polyhydroxylalkanoate), a high performance plastic.  PHA biodegrades quickly in compost piles and landfills, but otherwise it behaves the same or better than conventional petroleum-based plastic.  It resists water and odor permeation, and it holds up under high temperature and exposure to sun.  As a sustainable alternative to petroleum as a plastics feedstock, wastewater could be setting the gold standard.

SolarBee, the North Dakota company that has made a name for itself with solar-powered circulators to improve water quality in ponds and lakes, has developed solar equipment for wastewater treatment plants as well.  The devices could have a huge impact on electricity consumption at thousands of wastewater plants in the U.S. alone, without the need for costly retrofits.  A SolarBee unit requires only 36 watts to operate, and it improves the treatment process while replacing up to 25,000 watts of grid-connected equipment with sustainable solar power.

The workhorse of the microbe world could turn out to be Geobacter, a hairy looking organism that is actually capable of generating an electric current from mud or wastewater.  Professor Derek Lovley and a team of researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have announced that they successfully evolved a strain of Geobacter into a superbug that is eight times more powerful than other strains.  The breakthrough could lead to the development of a microbial fuel cell system scaled to individual homes, capable of producing electricity from the occupants’ household wastewater.  Geobacter-powered microbial fuel cells for vehicles, portable electronics, and even medical implants are among many other potential applications.

Wastewater treatment facilities end up dumping a lot of mud that is extracted from the in-flowing water. And, like everything else, that mud takes up space. Space that could be used for other things, even at the dumping yards. But researchers from the Rovira i Virgili University (URV) have suggested, and successfully shown, that the waste mud doesn’t need to be taken to a dumping ground; rather, it can be used as fuel.

When President Obama signed the American Recovery Act, he alloted 20% of the funds to be used for developing a green infrastructure, water and energy efficiency improvements and other environmentally innovative projects. And Delaware’s aging water infrastructure is smiling because of it.

One solution to the world’s water pollution problems could be something you can’t taste, touch, see, smell, or hear.  Especially hear.  Ultrasound, the range of frequencies beyond the limits of human hearing, is starting to emerge as an effective water treatment that is more sustainable than chemical dosing.  Researchers are discovering that ultrasound performs well on algae, and that’s only the beginning.  Ultrasound can remove a variety of pollutants in water, including those that affect the taste of America’s favorite fish, the catfish.

Having grown up in the beautiful Chicagoland area in the 80’s my water needs were strictly as follows: Need #1: Water from hose to power clown-face sprinkler, fill water balloons, and hose off muddy dirt-bike/self, Need #2: Water from faucet to occasionally brush teeth and occasionally make Hi-C or Tang, Need #3: Water from shower to occasionally bathe. It was a simpler time, and I was a kid. To me and most other kids (adults?) in the 80’s water was simply there, always on the ready for any and all of the above dalliances.

The days of water-logged frivolity are over. We now live in a time where many parts of the world face water shortages, limited access to safe, clean drinking water, an ever-diminishing groundwater supply, and a growing number of water-related disease and death.

In fact, just last week, motivated by three years of water shortages in California, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency which may be followed by water rationing measures.

As a result of the myriad of water emergencies that the world faces I have put together a short-list of the 5 world-saving water solutions that offer hope for the future of our water, and therefore our existence.