Sieving wastewater – Cellulose recovery, economic and energy evaluation

Application of fine-mesh sieves (<0.35 mm) as pretreatment for municipal biological wastewater treatment gives an opportunity to recover resources and increase sustainability of wastewater treatment processes. Sieves are traditionally used for single stage mechanical treatment (typical mesh of 0.35 mm) or in combination with an MBR (typical mesh >0.7 mm). When sieves with a mesh of 0.35 mm are used on raw sewage we observed that cellulose fibres mainly originating from toilet paper are removed efficiently from the influent with a high recovery and purity. The application of sieves as pretreatment for conventional activated sludge processes has been evaluated based on pilot plant research at three WWTPs in the Netherlands. With sieving applied to the dry weather flow only the overall energy usage of the WWTP including sludge treatment can be decreased by at least 40% with a payback time of 7 years.