Find out more below about our third WRE Conference and Exhibition Speakers and their talks for the opening session on Day 2 of the conference:
Rémi Declercq
R&D team coordinator, Ecofilae, France
Rémi Declercq is R&D team coordinator at ECOFILAE (Montpellier, France) and has ten years of professional experience dedicated to water reuse, environmental management, and agriculture irrigation. His technical skills are balanced by his understanding of the economic, social, environmental, regulatory, and organizational challenges faced by water reuse projects. He specialized in technical feasibility studies and Cost-Benefit Analysis and LCA approaches enabling to assess sustainability and profitability. Experienced with more than 60 projects in France and in low to middle-income countries, he has developed a special know-how on water reuse in agriculture and on the management of risks associated.
Keynote: Boosting the uptake of innovative solutions in the context of water and circular economy
The quantity and quality of water resources are serious problems in many European areas, being mostly the combined result of climate change and anthropic influences. The EU-funded BOOST-IN project aims at promoting technological changes, governance schemes, shifts in mind-set and organisational structures to solve these problems through better management of the water sector and the application of circular economy principles, enabling water reuse and recovery of different materials (e.g. energy, nutrients, metals). However, implementation of these changes still faces several barriers that need to be overcome. BOOST-IN will achieve these goals by an effective identification, selection through a specifically designed dynamic funnel method, and transfer of innovative solutions to further close and improve the water cycle. BOOST-IN aims to bridge the gap between R&D outcomes and market implementation by providing the necessary tools and support to bring these innovations to fruition. The project will develop and apply its approach in six Regions of opportunity evenly distributed across Europe.
The project was launched in January 2024, will run for three years, and involves 12 partners from nine countries. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 101135239.
Dirk Herold
Business Development Manager for Biological Wastewater Treatment, Xylem, Germany.
Dr Dirk Herold is Business Development Manager for Biological Wastewater Treatment at Xylem with a focus on filtration technologies and advanced biological treatment processes. Dirk has more than 25 years’ experience in the Water and Wastewater treatment industry and has worked with OEMs and membrane manufacturers before joining Xylem in 2012. Based in Germany Dirk supports customers, end users and Xylem sales teams globally to develop and realize tailored treatment solutions. These can include membrane or media filtration as well as UV or advanced oxidation technologies. In the past 5 years Dirk has been driving the market launch of Taron activated sludge filters with its innovative and patented product features.
Presentation: Activated Sludge Dynamic Filter – A new process for direct activated sludge filtration and production of high-quality effluent
Pilot and demonstration tests, as well as the first full scale installations, have validated the innovate activated sludge dynamic filter process to supplement or replace secondary clarification and tertiary filtration. These filters can increase the biological treatment capacity of existing wastewater treatment plant by operating the aeration basin at higher mixed liquor suspended solids (MLSS) concentrations compared to a conventional activated sludge treatment process, while achieving improved effluent quality in a smaller footprint. The filters can be installed in the aeration basin or in external tank for direct activated sludge filtration by formation of a dynamic sludge cake layer on the micro mesh panels of the rotating filter discs to produce filtrate with low total suspended solids (TSS). The filtration rate is controlled by adjusting the wastewater level, the rotational speed of the discs and the continuous backwash system of the filter which removes the sludge cake layer from the micro mesh panels after each rotation. During operation, the activated sludge dynamic filters have consistently produced effluent with suspended solids concentrations less than 10 mg/L, lower than secondary clarifiers, even during winter weather conditions. The high-quality filtrate produced is suitable for post treatment aiming for future reuse applications, e.g. UV disinfection or AOP. Taron represents a flexible process solution to increase treatment and hydraulic capacity of existing wastewater treatment plants and to meet more stringent effluent quality requirements without additional civil construction, that is easy to retrofit while maintaining plant operation.
Baptiste Mathon
R&D Engineer, Treewater, France.
Dr Baptiste Mathon is a chemist and process engineering expert specializing in advanced oxidation and emerging pollutant treatment. He earned his PhD in Chemistry and Process Engineering, with his thesis focusing on the kinetic modelling of the removal of organic micropollutants by advanced oxidation processes in municipal wastewater treatment plants. Since 2021, Dr Mathon has been working with Treewater, where he is responsible for managing the treatment of PFAS in industrial effluents. Dr Mathon is dedicated to developing efficient solutions to address some of the most persistent environmental contaminants.
Presentation: Remediation processes of PFAS in industrial effluents with advanced reduction and electrooxidation.
PFAS, due to their toxicity and persistence in the environment, are poorly removed by conventional systems. Current treatment solutions involve separative methods (activated carbon, membrane filtration) that transfer PFAS into smaller media or water volumes. Treewater is developing destructive treatment solutions for PFAS removal in industrial wastewater, with the goal of recycling treated waters in industrial processes. Two technologies have been tested:
- ElectRotate is an innovative and patented electrochemical advanced oxidation water treatment process (EAOP). This process shifts the paradigm by rotating micro-electrochemical cells
- directly in the treatment tank, resulting in low energy consumption and ease of application. Combining advanced oxidation treatment by electrooxidation and advanced reduction by PFOA removal by EAOP and EAOP/ERP in synthetic solution (SS) and real wastewater (RW) were tested.
First results on SS showed promising removal rates: PFOA concentration decreased by 10-fold after EAOP (1mg/L to 0.1mg/) with a current density of 12.5mAcm-2 and BDD anodes. The combination EAOP/ERP achieved 99% removal to obtain residual concentrations of 50 μg/L in PFOA. Energy consumption was low: 9 kWh/m3 after 1 hour, giving an EEO of 9 kWh.m-3.order-1 for EAOP (30 kWh.m-3.order-1 are required to achieve similar results with commercial EAOP) and 6 kWh.m-3.order-1 for EAOP/ERP.
Maria Lousada-Ferreira
Researcher, KWR Water Research Institute, The Netherlands.
Maria Lousada-Ferreira is a scientific researcher at KWR Water Research Institute, in the Netherlands. She works at Water Treatment and Resource Recovery Team, participating in projects dealing with water reuse, removal of organic micropollutants, optimization of wastewater treatment technologies, water management in industry, among other research areas. Maria Lousada-Ferreira is working for about 25 years with water and wastewater treatment technologies. She graduated as an Environmental Engineer in Portugal, at Nova University of Lisbon, and obtained her PhD at the Water Management Department of the Technical University of Delft, in the Netherlands.
Presentation: Water reuse as resilience tool against climate change- KWR’s contribution.
Climate change enabled the consideration of alternative water sources. Reuse of treated wastewater became a reality in several countries around the world. Nevertheless, it is well known that safe water reuse requires, not only optimised treatment technologies, but also planning, suitable regulations and stakeholder engagement. At KWR water research institute, water reuse is being addressed by multiple knowledge teams and projects. For instance, within the Water-Match-Maker project, a KWR financed project, a framework of water distribution is being planned, where treated wastewater is one of the possible water sources. Another example is the Water-Mining EU project, where digital tools were developed to enable, as follows: stakeholders’ engagement (Augmented Reality Apps); optimization of water and wastewater treatment technologies (real-time dashboards, with integrated advanced analytics); and market creation (the Water-Mining platform). Presently, KWR researchers with expertise in water distribution, hydro-informatics, eco- and geo-hydrology, water/wastewater treatment, water quality, innovation& valorization, governance, health, are all contributing to projects developing safe water reuse. Water reuse in no longer an exclusive technological challenge to be solved. Water reuse became an overarching societal tool, to create resilience against climate change.
