| Text | 305250 2013 municipal wastewater treatment sludge production SBBGR technology tourist areas Single step innovative process for municipal wastewater treatment in tourist areas Di Iaconi Claudio, Lopez Antonio Water Research Insitute CNR, Via F. De Blasio 5, 70132, Bari, Italy This paper reports the results obtained during a pilot experimentation aimed at testing the effectiveness of an innovative compact biological system for treating municipal wastewater in tourist areas. The results obtained after a long term operation have shown that the proposed system is able to assure average removal efficiencies higher than 90% for COD, total suspended solids, TKN and ammonia independently of the influent concentration values. Furthermore, the plant showed a high degree of operation flexibility and stability in response to the organic load variations occurring in tourist areas. High nitrogen removal efficiencies 80%, on average were also achieved thanks to the establishment of simultaneous nitrification denitrification process favoured by the plant s high biomass concentration and operating conditions. Finally, he plant system was characterized by an excess sludge production 80% lower than that of conventional biological systems operating without a primary clarifier. An acceptable level of stabilization of excess sludge was also obtained so that a further stabilization process was no longer required. Proceedings of the Final Conference and Stakeholders event of MEDIWAT Project Sustainable management of environmental issues related to water stress in Mediterranean islands 978 88 902822 3 2 The sustainable management of water resources is one of the main tools through which local economies can grow avoiding to overexploit natural resources. An effective management of our resources adversely affected by human activities is particularly needed at Med islands where, as for water resources, the progressive deterioration of their quality together with the continuous increase of their scarcity are locally threatening the environment e.g., landscape, rivers, aquifers, bathing water , the economy e.g., tourism, agriculture and the society e.g., population s decrease because of emigration phenomena towards water richer areas . Nevertheless, at such islands, integrated solutions for mitigating water availability shortening as well as water quality worsening are seldom taken into account when designing strategies for an effective and sustainable water resources management. In such a context, through its MED Programme 2007 2013 , cofinanced by the European Regional Development Fund, on June 2010 the EU funded the three year project Sustainable management of environmental issues related to water stress in Mediterranean islands whose acronym was MEDIWAT. The project has been aimed at providing Med islands Decision Makers with the technical, scientific and operational support necessary for elaborating their policy or for designing strategic plans to manage local water resources under quali quantitative stressed conditions. The main objective of MEDIWAT, then, has been identifying and/or developing innovative and integrated solutions and/or tools for managing problems related to water resources shortage and quality worsening. Capitolo file Final_Conference.pdf Contributo in volume claudio.diiaconi DI IACONI CLAUDIO antonio.lopez LOPEZ ANTONIO |
