A decision support system for localized planning of reclaimed water around wastewater treatment plants

Exploding population, industrialization, and an increase in water pollution has led to acute shrinkage in freshwater availability. Numerous countries have started exploring municipal wastewater as a new potential source of water to bring a paradigm shift from linearity to obtaining circularity in human water cycle management. This study aims to develop a decision support system for integrated water and wastewater management (DSS_IWWM), targeted towards reuse-focused selection of appropriate wastewater treatment technology, and localized planning around STPs in terms of reclaimed water demand identification, estimation, allocation, and sustainable pricing. The developed DSS_IWWM comprises of a repository of fourteen reuse purposes, reuse quality criteria, and 25 wastewater treatment technologies (WWTTs) in 360 combinations. It is sensitive to local resource scenarios and applies a socioeconomic and technology-focused methodology for addressing the interests of the community and investing agencies and viably. To validate the application of the DSS_IWWM, it is first tested with data from three cities in the state of Uttar Pradesh (India)—Lucknow, Prayagraj, and Agra—and then extended to nine more Indian cities with varying influent quality characteristics, resource inputs, existing STP technologies, and same target quality and decision criteria prioritization, to present a comparison of appropriate WWTTs and associated average prices obtained in different scenarios. It is concluded that influent quality, existing technology, and target quality criteria play significant role in selection of appropriate WWTTs. The traditional technologies such as UASB and ASP are required to be augmented and supplemented with high-performing WWTTs, such as BIOFOR-F with (C + F + RSF) and SBT + WP to obtain desired effluent quality. High-performing advanced oxidation process (AOP)-based systems such as A2O, SBR, and BIOFOR-F require WWTTs with relatively lower average costs (such as SBT and OP). The developed DSS_IWWM may prove to be very useful and beneficial for policymakers, government officials, engineers, and scientific community as it will facilitate rational decision-making for efficient investment planning in reuse focused wastewater treatment towards achieving circular economy in sustainable water resource management.