Would you drink the water coming out of a municipal Wastewater Treatment Facility ?

Would you drink the water coming out of a municipal WWTF (Wastewater Treatment Facility)?

The water from a WWTF normally goes into a river, a lake or underground. It is then piped in from another location and treated to make it potable, that is,  completely safe to drink.

But will people be willing to overcome the “yuck factor”?

This term, coined by  University of Pennsylvania bioethicist Arthur Caplan, describes the influence of instinctive responses against new technology, such as the reaction of most people to the thought of drinking reclaimed wastewater. Yet for obvious reasons, wastewater reuse is what must be practiced at, for example, the International Space Station.

Reusing wastewater immediately after treatment is being considered not only in areas where water is in short supply now or during reoccurring droughts, but also as a new way to provide sustainable sources of water for future growth.

In some modern buildings, water from sinks is cleaned up slightly and then reused for sanitary purposes, mostly flushing of toilets. But because of concerns for pathogens and other contaminants, it is rarely applied to drinking water which would need more sophisticated treatment to reach the required quality.

Techniques include ultrafiltration, reverse osmosis (RO), and use of ozone, ultraviolet light or other standard disinfection chemicals, all of which require the resilience of nickel-containing stainless steels. Most used are Types 304L (UNS S30403) or 316L (S31603), but duplex alloys are often used in RO facilities.

Surprisingly, some craft breweries are helping by promoting special batches of beer made with wastewater. Breweries in Sweden, Germany, the U.S., Canada and other countries have made such batches, which have sold out quickly.

“There’s a mental hurdle to get over of how inherently gross this could be,” says Jeremy McLaughlin, head brewer at Village Brewery. “But we know that this water is safe, and we stand by our process.”

While still in its infancy, water reuse is being developed in most parts of the world. We can certainly raise a glass to that!