Page 263 - Materials Chemistry, Second Edition

244 Life Cycle Assessment of Wastewater Treatment

12.1 INTRODUCTION: SUSTAINABILITY CHALLENGES
IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

Sustainable development means a balance between economic efficiency, social
equity, and environmental protection. According to the first definition of this term,
provided by the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED) in
1991, sustainable development consists of a “development that meets the needs of
the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own
needs” (WCED, 1991).
Nowadays, the world is facing challenges related to the three pillars of sustain-
ability: economy, society, and environment. In this context, to move from the current
scenario toward a sustainable development, a new way of thinking focused on social
inclusion needs to be implemented. In addition, changes in consumption and produc-
tion patterns, incentives for the preservation of natural resources, and inequality
reduction are crucial to the sustainability of humanity (United Nations (UN), 2013).
For developing countries particularly, sustainable development is even more chal-
lenging, as they face significant urban environmental issues due to rapid urbanization,
population growth, inability to manage climate and environmental risks, inefficient
governance, corruption, and investment restrictions (Ameen and Mourshed, 2017).
So, unfortunately, sustainability concepts in developing countries remain only
theoretical rather than finding practical application. Indeed, due to the aforemen-
tioned factors, currently, sustainable development concepts are in reality scarcely
observed in most developing countries.

12.2 WASTEWATER AND SUSTAINABILITY
Nowadays, sustainability has become a core issue of wastewater management
(Massoud et al., 2009). For Andersson et al. (2016), few areas of investment today
have as much to offer to the global shift toward sustainable development as sanita-
tion and wastewater management. The role of wastewater management in a sustain-
able society is to act as an instrument to minimize environmental burdens, preserve
human health, and create business opportunities.
Actually, the importance of wastewater for sustainability involves not only the
traditional function of pollutant emission reduction but also the development of
resource recovery practices. According to Mateo-Sagasta et al. (2015), the world’s
3
daily generation of municipal wastewater is estimated to be 900 million m . The
same author also estimates that the wastewater from a city with a population of
10 million inhabitants presents enough nutrients to fertilize about 500,000 hectares
of agricultural land. The correct estimation of pollutant emission and the determina-
tion of resource recovery potential are crucial figures that directly affect the defini-
tion of strategies that aim for sustainability of the wastewater management system.
Indeed, for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP, 2010), a crucial
point in better understanding water and sanitation challenges is the quality of data,
as it allows the identification of problems and opportunities contributing to the devel-
opment of sustainable solutions. However, a consolidated database grouping water