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Effect of Climate Change in Wastewater Treatment Plants: Reviewing the Problems and Solutions

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Managing Water Resources under Climate Uncertainty

Part of the book series: Springer Water ((SPWA))

Abstract

Climate change is considered to be one of the main challenges to urban wastewater systems in future decades. It is estimated that climate change has a dual effect on wastewater treatment (WWT) plants. The processes occurring in a wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) are subsequently affected by climate change; more extreme weather events and earlier snowmelt runoff will lead to more untreated sewer overflows, increased flooding, etc. Due to increased scarcity of water resources, wastewater reuse will become more necessary as climate change accelerates. On the other hand, during wastewater treatment, greenhouse gases (GHGs) including carbon dioxide (CO2) from aerobic (oxidation processes), methane (CH4) from anaerobic processes (3–19 % of global anthropogenic methane emissions), and nitrous oxide (N2O) (3 % of N2O emissions from all sources) associated with nitrification/denitrification (NDN) processes, as an intermediate product, can be emitted to the atmosphere. The various problems associated with climate change and WWT operation and the solutions that can be applied to deal with them are discussed in this chapter.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, P.O. Box 116, 54124, Thessaloniki, Greece

    Anastasios Zouboulis & Athanasia Tolkou

Authors
  1. Anastasios Zouboulis
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  2. Athanasia Tolkou
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Correspondence to Anastasios Zouboulis .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Water Engineering and Management, Asian Institute of Technology, Klong Luang, Pathum Thani, Thailand

    Sangam Shrestha

  2. Food Engineering & Bioprocess Technology, Asian Institute of Technology, Klong Luang, Thailand

    Anil K. Anal

  3. School of Env., Res. and Development, Asian Institute of Technology, City, Thailand

    P. Abdul Salam

  4. The Netherlands Ntl. Committee IHP-HWRP, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Michael van der Valk

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Zouboulis, A., Tolkou, A. (2015). Effect of Climate Change in Wastewater Treatment Plants: Reviewing the Problems and Solutions. In: Shrestha, S., Anal, A., Salam, P., van der Valk, M. (eds) Managing Water Resources under Climate Uncertainty. Springer Water. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-10467-6_10

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