首页 | 本学科首页   官方微博 | 高级检索  
     检索      


Cost-benefit analysis of central softening for production of drinking water
Authors:B Van der Bruggen  H Goossens  PA Everard  K Stemgée  W Rogge
Institution:1. K.U. Leuven, Department of Chemical Engineering, Laboratory for Applied Physical Chemistry and Environmental Technology, W. de Croylaan 46, B - 3001 Leuven, Belgium;2. VMW, Vlaamse Maatschappij voor Watervoorziening, Belliardstraat 73, B-1000 Brussel, Belgium
Abstract:Softening drinking water before distribution yields advantages with environmental impact, such as lower household products consumption, less scaling in piping and machines, and the avoidance of decentralized, domestic softeners. Central softening is under consideration in Flanders by the largest water supplier, VMW (Dutch acronym for “Flemish Company for Water Supply”), to deliver soft (15 °F) water to their customers. A case study is presented for a region with hard water (47 °F). The chosen technique is the pellet reactor, based on precipitation of CaCO3 by NaOH addition. This softening operation has possibly large impact on the environment and the water consumption pattern.A cost-benefit analysis has been made to estimate the added value of central softening, by investigating the impact on the drinking water company, on their customers, on employment, on environment, on health, etc. The analysis for the region of study revealed benefits for customers which were higher than the costs for the drinking water company. However, pricing of drinking water remains an important problem.A sensitivity analysis of these results has also been made, to evaluate the impact of important hypothesis, and to be able to expand this study to other regions. The conclusions for this part show that softening is beneficial if water hardness is to be decreased by at least 5 °F.
Keywords:
本文献已被 ScienceDirect 等数据库收录!
设为首页 | 免责声明 | 关于勤云 | 加入收藏

Copyright©北京勤云科技发展有限公司  京ICP备09084417号