Wastewater management systems

Umeå Municipality has a total of 19 wastewater treatment plants. The largest handles waste water from households and various companies in the area. Every year, it receives about 13 million cubic metres of waste water, containing 3,000 tonnes of organic material and 80 tonnes of phosphorus. And every day it produces 23,000 kWh of biogas. Umeå’s largest treatment plant manages the waste water of 166,000 inhabitants (including industrial load) and can purify up to 8,100 cubic metres of waste water an hour.

This effective simple and versatile process removes microorganisms and reduces disinfection by-products from water using elemental iron. It can be incorporated into various treatment systems/devices and involves minimal maintenance and operation costs. This process has been proven to remove the viruses Φ X174 MS2 Aichivirus and Adenovirus 41 as well as bacteria such as E. coli O157:H7. It has been demonstrated that the elemental iron can reduce disinfection by-product precursors such as natural organic matter.

The University of Florida is seeking companies interested in a system for controlling the chlorine concentration in the water effluent from wastewater treatment plants to better comply with Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations and to reduce operational costs. This technology automatically regulates the time that the chlorinated water spends in the contact basin effectively compensating for the variability of residence (detention) time caused by inevitable daily and seasonal fluctuations in the inlet flow rates received by the plant.

At Alsterbro sewage treatment plant, wastewater is purified in three steps.

Öresundsverket in Helsingborg treats the wastewater from the 140,000 inhabitants through a biological process.

Two sewage treatment works in Stockholm are producing biogas from sewage sludge. After having purified the gas, it can be used for both heating and vehicle fuel and in addition creates no net emissions of carbon dioxide. Consequently, the treatment works have reduced their amount of emissions and become energy suppliers. Therefore, sewage sludge is no longer an environmental problem, but an important energy resource.

Thanks to a large-scale installation of composting and a hundreds of separate sewers, the municipality of Norrtälje has managed to reduce a leakage of nutrients with five tons to the Baltic Sea. These actions have raised the property owner’s interest for Eco-cycle solutions and the municipality has gained a valuable knowledge in eco-cycle adapted water and sewage sytems.

Koholmens Wastewater Treatment Plant is designed for 57,000 inhabitants and is the heart of Karlskrona system for the resort's sewage management. To this place is headed wastewater from Karlskrona urban areas, from the neighboring islands, as well as from the sewage treatment plant at Sanda Island and from the population at Sturkö Island.

Käppalaverket is one of the world's most efficient water treatment installations, with the entire northern Stockholm as a catchment area. Apart from the fact that the installation treats water for over 500 000 people, it also produces biogas, running 100 busses.

Sjölunda Wastewater Treatment Plant, Malmö At the Sjölunda plant in Malmö wastewater from 550,000 inhabitants is treated. The plant was built in 1963. Recently expansion of biological treatment has reduced the use of precipitation chemicals to meet the Swedish requirements and the plant has at the same time reached emission requirements of organic compounds, phosphorous, and nitrogen. The sludge produced is used at the plant’s own production unit for biogas.