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.

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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!

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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.

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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.

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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.

This is great news for industries that are trying to comply with the Kyoto Protocol and cut CO2 emissions. It is also good news in a world that is trying to shake itself free of the addictions to traditional oils and coals.

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When President Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, he allotted 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.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced today that $19,239,100 will be awarded to the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control in order to upgrade its out-of-date water infrastructure.

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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.

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The American Chemical Society reports that aerogel or “frozen smoke” may be the holy grail of sponges for capturing oil from wastewater and soaking up oil spills. Unlike other costly and inefficient sponges, hydrophobic silica aerogels are both highly porous and absorbent.

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The questionable water treatment facilities were found to release levels of the antibiotic ciprofloxacin which were 5 times higher than the daily consumption of the entire country of Sweden. At levels that high, there is an increased risk of breeding “super germs”, drug-resistant bacteria which have evolved an immunity to antibiotics.

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In the race to implement new energy sources, farms have an advantage: lots of manure. A large chicken farm north of Beijing is taking advantage of this fact by using its chicken manure to generate power and heat. And this isn’t just a small-time farm—the 3 million chickens on the farm produce 220 tons of manure and 170 tons of wastewater each day.

The Deqingyuan Chicken Farm Waste Utilization Plant, which is replacing a coal-fired plant, will reduce CO2 emissions by 95,000 tons a year. It will also provide 14,600 MWh of electricity each year.

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Paul was excited about Sonoma County’s plan to achieve “carbon-free” water by 2015 - that is, using renewable energy sources such as solar and geothermal to power the county’s entire network of treatment plants and pumps. The plan is close to being released and today the SF Chronicle reported on one of the key initiatives to take the waste out of wastewater.

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Image courtesy of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service via Wikimedia Commons.

One possibility is treating a single home’s waste in order to produce localized power for the unit. Of course, I rather see that process implemented on a grand scale like for businesses. But it is more likely to take root developing countries.

And for you Apple geeks there might even be a crap-powered iPhone in your future.

The researchers grew the bacteria on graphite electrodes using acetate as a food for the colony. Once the slimy biofilm was formed they added a small 400-millivolt current that forced the Geobacter to lose more electrons.

Lovely and his colleagues first discovered the Geobacter back in 1987 in sediment under the Potomac River. Initially it was used in decontaminating soil as it respires iron and other metals similarly to the way we breathe. It was in 2002 when they discovered it could produce electricity from organic matter and all hell broke loose. But it wasn’t til 2005 that the electrically conductive pili were discovered.

A genus of proteobacteria, Geobacter are an anaerobic respiration bacterial species. It was the first organism with the ability to oxidize radioactive metals and petroleum compounds into environmentally benign carbon dioxide.

Source: Wikipedia/Science Daily/CleanTechnica

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