废水处理的重要性

废水处理工厂的重要性

水处理工厂旨在加速净化水的自然流程。数十亿人产生越来越多的废水，自然流程正在超负荷工作。如果不进行废水处理，大量废水会带来严重破坏，今天的发展中国家/地区情况仍是如此。全球范围内有超过 80% 的废水未经处理即排放。¹ 拥有水处理工厂的国家/地区使用各种方法处理水，以实现共同的目标：尽可能净化水并将其送回环境，以确保人类和地球的安全和繁荣。

废水处理有助于保护人类和生态系统

废水中含有对人类和生态系统有毒的元素。废水处理工厂有助于净化水并消除发展中国家/地区目前正在经历的糟糕情况。不干净的水带来了重大的健康风险，造成每年 170 万人死亡，其中 90% 以上事件发生在发展中国家/地区。² 许多发展中国家/地区仍然普遍存在水相关的疾病，如霍乱和血吸虫病，在这些国家/地区，只有很小一部分（某些情况下不到 5%）的生活和城市废水是经处理后才排放到环境中³.

废水处理还有助于保护生态系统。鱼类和水生生物需要淡水。当其所生活的水环境充满废水时，它们就无法生存。如果氮和磷酸盐等化学物质过量进入溪流、河流或大片水域，会导致植物过度生长，并将毒素释放到水中。这会导致氧气耗尽和死亡区域的扩大，即不再有鱼类和其他水生生物的区域。

天然水处理流程正在超负荷工作

虽然大自然母亲一直在尽其最大努力以自然的方式处理废水，但她的负荷实在太重。全球人口如此庞大且还在不断增长，废水也是如此。自然处理速度无法应对过量废水。并且，随着人口的增长，废水量也在不断增加。

将净化水排放回环境

废水处理工厂模仿自然流程净化水并将其送回环境。处理废水有几种方法。以下信息图，来自环境保护署 (EPA) 的废水处理 101⁴解释了废水处理的基本操作。

总结

废水处理工厂的主要目标是保护人类和生态系统免受废水中有害和有毒元素的影响。由于水的自然处理过程超负荷，水处理工厂的目标是加速净化水的自然过程。这些工厂使用各种方式处理废水，然后将净化后的水送回环境中。

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参考

1. 联合国教科文组织，2017 年，世界水资源开发报告，废水：未开发的资源， https://reliefweb.int/report/world/2017-un-world-water-development-report-wastewater-untapped-resource于 2020 年 3 月 10 日访问。
2. 世界水评估计划 (UNESCO WWAP)， http://www.unesco.org/new/en/natural-sciences/environment/water/wwap/wwdr/于 2020 年 3 月 10 日访问。
3. 更好的污水处理对人类健康和生态系统至关重要， https://www.unenvironment.org/news-and-stories/story/better-sewage-treatment-critical-human-health-and-ecosystems于 2020 年 3 月 10 日访问。
4. 您能通过采取何种措施保护当地水道？ https://www3.epa.gov/npdes/pubs/ centralized_brochure.pdf于 2020 年 3 月 12 日访问。

The world’s 8 billion people create a lot of wastewater — another word for sewage — enough that the natural water purification process is insufficient on its own to remove the harmful chemicals that cause disease in not just people but flora, fish and wildlife.

Wastewater treatment removes contaminants and suspended solids from wastewater; this treated, potable water can then be dispatched back into the ecosystem free from man-made contaminants.

Why do we treat wastewater? Without treatment, the amount of wastewater in the environment would cause devastation. It does so, in fact, in developing nations: Globally, over 80 percent of all wastewater is discharged without treatment. This leads to mass illness and severe disruption of the food chain.

Untreated wastewater poses significant health risks, accounting for 1.7 million deaths annually - over 90 percent of those in developing nations¹.

Untreated wastewater can also cause²:
 

• Campylobacteriosis
• Cryptosporidiosis
• Escherichia coli Diarrhea
• Encephalitis
• Gastroenteritis
• Giardiasis
• Hepatitis A
• Poliomyelitis
• Salmonellosis
• Tyhphoid Fever
• Yersiniosis
• Cholera
• Schistosomiasis

The above diseases are seen not just in developing nations but in the U.S. as well. Wastewater treatment is one of the best defenses we have against stopping these diseases and saving lives.
 

Effects of Wastewater Pollutants on the Ecosystem

When nitrogen, phosphates, or rotting organic matter pollute bodies of water in large amounts, the result is unusual plant growth. These plants then secrete toxins which leads to oxygen depletion. And that’s what causes so-called 'dead zones' or uninhabitable aquatic ecosystems.

Untreated wastewater is toxic to non aquatic animals, including people. But ingesting wastewater itself is not the sole problem. Upstream wastewater contamination poisons the food chain: Polluted algae contaminates the fish that eat it, which poison the bears that eat them, and so on.

Wastewater pollution is also responsible for what’s known as red tide³, a mass killing off of aquatic animals that can pollute large volumes of water, making entire human-serving water systems non potable.
 

Wastewater Treatment 101

The natural wastewater detoxification process is overloaded — there is simply too much sewage for nature to keep up with. Wastewater treatment helps to remove the waste and keep our ecosystem healthy.

Basic wastewater treatment occurs in three treatment parts: Primary, secondary and advanced. The following infographic, Wastewater Treatment 101⁴, from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) explains the basic operation of wastewater treatment.
 

As the above illustrates, modern pollution levels are so great that a single sifting process is seldom enough to make water potable.

The Goal of Wastewater Treatment

The main goal of wastewater treatment facilities is to protect people, as well as local ecosystems, from toxic elements found in wastewater.

Water treatment facilities were designed to speed up the natural process of purifying water because the natural process can’t keep up with the amount of waste society produces. Without wastewater treatment and other recycling processes, everyday life would be considerably more hazardous; it remains so in developing nations lacking established wastewater treatment systems.
 

References

1. UNESCO, 2017, World Water Development Report, Wastewater: The untapped resource, https://reliefweb.int/report/world/2017-un-world-water-development-report-wastewater-untapped-resource
2. World Water Assessment Programme (UNESCO WWAP), http://www.unesco.org/new/en/natural-sciences/environment/water/wwap/wwdr/
3. Better sewage treatment critical for human health and ecosystems, https://www.unenvironment.org/news-and-stories/story/better-sewage-treatment-critical-human-health-and-ecosystems
4. What can you do to protect local waterways?, https://www3.epa.gov/npdes/pubs/ centralized_brochure.pdf