Abstract
Water scarcity threatens the health and development of countries worldwide due to the rapid expansion of population and climate change, pushing the government to find more innovative and sustainable ways to address water stress. Governments have adopted reverse Osmosis (RO) seawater desalination technology for its cheap raw water intake and stability. However, its environmental and financial sustainability remains disputable. In this study, three metrics, carbon footprint, cost, and waste discharge, are defined and analyzed to identify which water supply technology has greater prospects. Accounting for a full water treatment process from raw water intake to transportation and distribution, the RO desalination plant outruns traditional water treatment facilities due to less carbon emission, limited operation cost and maintenance, and less hazardous waste discharge. The qualitative and quantitative analysis of environmental and financial sustainability of existing solutions to the water supply may provide a more comprehensive understanding and further supports policy making.
Highlights
Water is a precious and increasingly scarce resource
This study focuses on the sustainability of the two approaches-reverse Osmosis (RO), the desalination plant, and the water treatment plant, dealing with carbon footprint and the entire process from raw water intake to transportation and distribution
The study focuses on the data of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of the two plants
Summary
Water is a precious and increasingly scarce resource. It is critical for ecosystem functions (as both habitat and resource) and essential for humans [1]. Accessible freshwater resources are rivers, lakes, and groundwater, accounting for about 0.28 % of the earth's total water storage. Global water shortage and imbalanced regional distribution have become a rising concern. With the rapid expansion of population, it is estimated that water shortage will affect 3 billion people in the world and 40 countries and regions. How to reach a more sustainable, reliable, environmentally, and economically friendly water supply solution becomes a global problem, in arid and semiarid areas
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