Construction and exploration of pollutant consumption oxygen equivalent treatment costs in municipal wastewater treatment plants

The study of wastewater treatment costs is an important aspect of the operation and management of municipal wastewater treatment plants. People usually focus on the treatment cost per cubic meter of wastewater. However, this indicator is far too simple as it only considers the economics and so does not reasonably evaluate the operation conditions within the wastewater treatment plants. In view of this, this work considers two other measures, the pollutant consumption oxygen equivalent (PCOE), and the PCOE treatment cost (PCOETC). PCOETC not only reflects the total pollutant removal, but also how much the wastewater treatment costs. The feasibility and practicality of PCOETC usage is verified by the study of wastewater treatment costs in 18 wastewater treatment plants in southwest China. The obtained results show that PCOETC is a better indicator than the common statistical indicator (i.e. the treatment cost of per cubic meter of wastewater) for expressing the wastewater treatment cost.