Water reuse planning model for the greater Chicago area.

摘要

A water reuse planning model is developed in this study especially for non-arid urban area. While water reuse, one of many water conservation practices, is widely practiced in many arid areas in the world, it is not widely practiced in areas adjacent to abundant water bodies such as Chicago. An efficient water reuse planning model is critical to deal with increasing future water demand, and also help a region to improve its urban water use efficiency.;A comprehensive study about Chicago water diversion, allocation, use, reclamation and reuse is conducted to justify reusing treated wastewater is able to close the gap between increasing future water demand and limit water supply. Analyses on treated wastewater quality, potential human health risk, regulations and guidelines, and reuse scenarios make sure treated wastewater can be a safe supplement and even cost competitive to municipal water.;As cost is the major concern in water reuse planning, empirical cost equations are revisited. A pipeline installation cost equation is especially developed using on local data after a commonly used cost equation is found misleading, and more importantly, pipeline installation cost is found dominating the overall cost of water reuse.;Geographic Information Systems techniques are incorporated to locate potential users. A water reuse efficiency factor (demand over distance) is first defined in this study to lay out pipeline trees, compare reuse efficiencies of different sites, and help to develop a regional water reuse cost equation that for the first time pipeline length as a variable being introduced in a water reuse planning model.;The model developed in this study is capable of including capital cost in the optimization process. Furthermore, current water use system is not left behind when developing the planning model. The non-linear optimization is within one system boundary which including current water use system and proposed reuse system.;The model results show the possible water shortage for public supply in the Greater Chicago area is between 2016 and 2027 in this study. To meet the future water demand, the best scenario result is to deliver 1.25 MGD treated wastewater to industrial users by a 42-mile-long second distribution pipeline.