On 16th
of October 2012, in the Hanseatic capital of Gdansk, Poland – the Project on
Urban Reduction of Eutrophication (PURE) has held its Final Conference “Practical experiences on advanced municipal sewage treatment”. During the two-day event around
150 representatives of wastewater treatment plants, municipality and
environmental authorities, as well as international and non-governmental
organizations has gathered to share the results of the project, and consider
how its valuable lessons could be used in other cities across the Baltic Sea
catchment area.
PURE project has succeeded in motivating the
cities for voluntary actions, aimed at improving the fragile state of the
Baltic Sea environment. Something concrete was achieved too: three PURE partner water companies
have implemented investments in their treatment plants to enhance phosphorus
removal. Once completed, the measures will result in reduction of the annual
phosphorus load into the Baltic Sea by 300-500 tonnes (which equals 1/2 of the
total annual phosphorus load from Finland to the Gulf of Finland and the
Archipelago Sea!)
Moreover, the project has identified solutions
for improving the sludge handling within wastewater treatment and a book on
good sludge management practices, first of its kind in the Baltic Sea Region, soon
available electronically. Further, a new online tool “PURE BenchMark” has been
developed, to improve sharing and visualizing information on municipal
wastewater treatment and loads to the Baltic Sea.
Picture: water utilities are the real superheroes of the Baltic Sea
Author: Olena Zinchuk
No comments:
Post a Comment