Recycling Treated Municipal Wastewater for Industrial Water Use

Recycling Treated Wastewater For Industrial Water Use in MN
March 15, 2007 Industry Stakeholder Workshop
Issues Table
Institutional Issues
Topic Discussion
• Question: Why is MCES evaluating water reuse?
o Protection of water resources
To sustain water supplies - keep potable supplies available for potable uses.
To meet water quality goals established for Minnesota’s waters – reduced
discharges is one option to meet more stringent discharge limits in the future.
o Requested by the legislature
State-wide evaluation
Metro area focus particularly with access to resources and data for metro area
facilities and industries.
• This question promoted discussion of industries using a reclaimed supply – extent of the
benefit.
o Need a consumption of a water supply by an industry to provide benefit to a receiving
stream in terms of reduced pollutant loadings
For facilities using once-through cooling, taking river water and discharging it
back to the river – there is limited benefit to the receiving stream.
However, if the surface water source has limited withdrawals, then replacing the
surface water supply with a reclaimed supply can benefit the waterway with
sustained flows/lake or reservoir levels.
o Replacing a ground water supply with reclaimed water conserves the potable supply,
regardless if the water is consumed by industry operations.
• Reclaimed water can be a competitor to water utilities, particularly those with excess capacity.
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