Pitfalls in international benchmarking of energy intensity across wastewater treatment utilities

Walker, Nathan; Williams, A. Prysor; Styles, David

doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2021.113613

Cited by 22 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…The addition of theophylline (bottom panel, orange) results in the conformational change of the mRNA, making the SD available for mRFP1 translation. (B) Normalized activity of the P BAD -driven and theophylline-controlled riboswitch library (six riboswitch sequences labeled as E, F, G, H, I, J as previously described , and L, control without a riboswitch sequence) cloned upstream the mRFP1 fluorescent protein. Fluorescence was measured in relative fluorescence units (RFU).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The most recent proof-of-concept study focusing on potential biotechnological applications of C. metallidurans CH34 highlighted its capacity to degrade toluene while generating bioelectricity in microbial fuel cells (MFCs), 22 thereby opening the possibility to use this microorganism for the remediation of wastewaters contaminated with recalcitrant xenobiotic and simultaneous recovery of energy. As current wastewater treatment technologies require more than 2% of the world’s electricity production (with local municipalities using up to 20% of their energy supply for recovery of wastewaters), 23 development of efficient MFC technologies able to purify wastewaters and recover energy in the form of electricity is needed. Nevertheless, MFCs struggle to find commercial applications due to a low voltage output.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Synthetic Biology Toolbox, Including a Single-Plasmid CRISPR-Cas9 System to Biologically Engineer the Electrogenic, Metal-Resistant Bacterium Cupriavidus metallidurans CH34

et al. 2022

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Cupriavidus metallidurans CH34 exhibits extraordinary metabolic versatility, including chemolithoautotrophic growth; degradation of BTEX (benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylene); high resistance to numerous metals; biomineralization of gold, platinum, silver, and uranium; and accumulation of polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB). These qualities make it a valuable host for biotechnological applications such as bioremediation, bioprocessing, and the generation of bioelectricity in microbial fuel cells (MFCs). However, the lack of genetic tools for strain development and studying its fundamental physiology represents a bottleneck to boosting its commercial applications. In this study, inducible and constitutive promoter libraries were built and characterized, providing the first comprehensive list of biological parts that can be used to regulate protein expression and optimize the CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing tools for this host. A single-plasmid CRISPR-Cas9 system that can be delivered by both conjugation and electroporation was developed, and its efficiency was demonstrated by successfully targeting the pyrE locus. The CRISPR-Cas9 system was next used to target candidate genes encoding type IV pili, hypothesized by us to be involved in extracellular electron transfer (EET) in this organism. Single and double deletion strains (ΔpilA, ΔpilE, and ΔpilAE) were successfully generated. Additionally, the CRISPR-Cas9 tool was validated for constructing genomic insertions (ΔpilAE::gf p and ΔpilAE::λ Pr gfp). Finally, as type IV pili are believed to play an important role in extracellular electron transfer to solid surfaces, C. metallidurans CH34 ΔpilAE was further studied by means of cyclic voltammetry using disposable screen-printed carbon electrodes. Under these conditions, we demonstrated that C. metallidurans CH34 could generate extracellular currents; however, no difference in the intensity of the current peaks was found in the ΔpilAE double deletion strain when compared to the wild type. This finding suggests that the deleted type IV pili candidate genes are not involved in extracellular electron transfer under these conditions. Nevertheless, these experiments revealed the presence of different redox centers likely to be involved in both mediated electron transfer (MET) and direct electron transfer (DET), the first interpretation of extracellular electron transfer mechanisms in C. metallidurans CH34.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Synthetic Biology Toolbox, Including a Single-Plasmid CRISPR-Cas9 System to Biologically Engineer the Electrogenic, Metal-Resistant Bacterium Cupriavidus metallidurans CH34

et al. 2022

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“…This was supported by Denmark being the second largest average consuming country (1.35 kWh m −3 ), since it has some of strictest effluent standards in the world." [39] According to some estimates, [40] worldwide ≈65 WWTP have reached zero energy emissions, although this is encouraging, still a minority of WWTP in both the US and Europe achieve energy self-sufficiency. [41] Assuming that the average energy consumption in WWTPs is 0.85 kWh m −3 , the water can contain up to 12 times more energy than what is needed for its treatment.…”

Section: Energymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…[ 38 ] A recent worldwide survey of energy use in WWTP conclude that “(some) EU states had the largest average (water consumption) kWh m −3 with 1.18 which appeared a result of the higher wastewater effluent standards of the region. This was supported by Denmark being the second largest average consuming country (1.35 kWh m −3 ), since it has some of strictest effluent standards in the world.” [ 39 ]…”

Section: Circular Economy and Wastewater Resource Recoverymentioning

confidence: 99%

Challenges for Circular Economy under the EU 2020/741 Wastewater Reuse Regulation

Berbel

Mesa‐Pérez

Simón³

2023

Global Challenges

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Wastewater reuse is seen as an opportunity to support a circular economy and optimize water resources. However, the use of wastewater is limited by the need for the proper protection of health and the environment and demands a certain minimum quality of treated reclaimed water. The objective of this work is to evaluate the opportunities both for the agents in the water treatment chain (from municipalities to farmers) and for technology providers under the recently approved Regulation EU‐2020/741. The new market and opportunities require new value chains, technology development, governance, risk assurance, and adapted local regulation. Bottlenecks also pose technological, environmental, institutional, economic, and social challenges. The identified needs and barriers must be properly addressed in order to accelerate the transformation of the water sector toward the circular economy. As a conclusion, Reg EU 2020/741 introduces minimum requirements for urban wastewater reuse and requires the definition of risk management and transparency. The real impact of regulation on circular‐economy objectives is limited by water scarcity and crop profitability. Social acceptance is critical for success.

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“…In line with the Sectoral Decarbonization Approach, which allows companies to set sectorspecific emissions targets according to output intensity indicators [30,29] and in accordance with the theory of Strategic Bench-marking, whose scope stretches from national to global corporations, within and across sectors, as a management practice and investigation methodology [31,32], we herein propose a bench-marking approach based on allometric scaling and self-reporting data. As an example, we consider the case of insurance & brokers.…”

Section: Testing the Benchmark: The Insurance And Brokers Sectormentioning

confidence: 99%

Allometric scaling in global corporations as a benchmarking approach to assess environmental performance

Burg¹,

Shan²,

Hubacek³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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The largest 6,529 international corporations are accountable for almost 30% of global CO 2 e emissions. A growing awareness of the role of the corporate world in the path toward sustainability has led many shareholders and stakeholders to pursue increasingly stringent and ambitious environmental goals. However, how to assess the corporate environmental performance objectively and efficiently remains an open question. This study reveals underlying dynamics and structures that can be used to construct a unified quantitative picture of the environmental impact of companies. This study shows that the environmental impact (metabolism) of companies CO 2 energy used, water withdrawal and waste production, scales with their size according to a simple power law which is often sublinear, and can be used to derive a sector-specific, size-dependent benchmark to asses unambiguously a company's environmental performance. Enforcing such a benchmark would potentially result in a 15% emissions reduction, but a fair and effective environmental policy should consider the size of the corporation and the super or sublinear nature of the allometric relationship.

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Pitfalls in international benchmarking of energy intensity across wastewater treatment utilities

Cited by 22 publications

References 53 publications

Synthetic Biology Toolbox, Including a Single-Plasmid CRISPR-Cas9 System to Biologically Engineer the Electrogenic, Metal-Resistant Bacterium Cupriavidus metallidurans CH34

Synthetic Biology Toolbox, Including a Single-Plasmid CRISPR-Cas9 System to Biologically Engineer the Electrogenic, Metal-Resistant Bacterium Cupriavidus metallidurans CH34

Challenges for Circular Economy under the EU 2020/741 Wastewater Reuse Regulation

Allometric scaling in global corporations as a benchmarking approach to assess environmental performance

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