Wastewater treatment is the process used to change wastewater into an outflow that can be returned to the water cycle with least impact on environment, or that can be directly reused for consumption or other uses such as drinking, irrigation, water recreation, river flow conservation, and water supply at industries (Sol J. Arceivala, 2006) . This process relates to this week’s theme of sustaining our water resources, considering it is aimed at improving quality of water considered as waste by reducing contaminants such as bacteria and chemicals to make it ready for final use. Due to limited supply of fresh water in many regions, wastewater treatment helps save water resources from the risk of overuse since it helps regulate water supply.
Wastewater treatment helps an individual’s life mostly their health since there are reduced human health problems and water-borne diseases. In the case of aquatic life such as fish, wastewater treatment helps control population by minimizing their deaths, which helps balance the ecosystem (Sol J. Arceivala, 2006) . This is inter-related to the case of physical environment since treatment of wastewater helps regulate global temperature. Wastewater once released usually affects temperature considering that it raises temperature of the receiving streams and thus, when it is treated it automatically solves the problem on temperature (Sol J. Arceivala, 2006) . Wastewater treatment helps maintain environmental sustainability since pollution that may have been caused by the wastewater is controlled and in turn, there is sustainable yields in cases of renewable resources and nonrenewable resources are not fully exhausted. Wastewater treatment is not a hindrance to attaining environmental sustainability and can actually be promoted by use of new technology such as thermal hydrolysis.
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In order to promote environmental sustainability, a couple of methods could be used and these methods involve members from different fields. At the individual level, a person should train themselves to drink water from the tap other than always depend on use of bottled water (Vezzoli, 2018) . This helps to reduce the number of waste plastics that are disposed. Another way involves the government coming up with rules that govern management of waste disposal from industries (Vezzoli, 2018) . The government should direct industries to treat waste materials before they release them to the environment. At community level, sustainability can be achieved through creating awareness. Individuals can be educated on the best uses of wastewater, and this information can be spread to as many individuals as possible. Communities can liaise with programs dealing with conservation projects, and help in minimizing usage of fresh water.
References
Sol J. Arceivala, S. R. (2006). Wastewater Treatment for Pollution Control and Reuse. New York: Tata McGraw-Hill Education.
Vezzoli, C. A. (2018). Design for Environmental Sustainability: Life Cycle Design of Products. New York: Springer.
