The World Water Development Report 2018
The 2018 edition of the World Water Development Report (WWDR 2018) seeks to inform policy and decision-makers, inside and outside the water community, about the potential of nature-based solutions (NBS) to address contemporary water management challenges across all sectors, and particularly regarding water for agriculture, sustainable cities, disaster risk reduction and improving water quality.
Project ANSWER. Assoc. Prof. Despo Fatta-Kassinos, Dr. Lida Ioannou-Ttofa.
In response to the increasing problem of water shortage, the reuse of treated urban wastewater is considered as the most suitable and reliable alternative for sustainable water management and agricultural development. Although wastewater reuse is accompanied by a number of benefits, several important questions are still unanswered and barriers exist regarding the safe and sustainable reuse practices. It is well-known that the available conventional technologies fail to completely remove several chemical and biological contaminants of emerging concern, such as antibiotics (A) and mobile antibiotic resistant elements; antibiotic-resistant bacteria and antibiotic resistance genes (ARB&ARGs). The latter are now considered as a serious public health problem by the scientific community, because of their spread in the environment, the food chain, drinking water, etc.
The EU funded project, ANSWER “Antibiotics and mobile resistance elements in wastewater application: risks and innovative solutions is a Marie Curie Training Network, which supports 15 Early-Stage Researchers (ESRs) in an interdisciplinary training network to investigate the highly complex factors driving antibiotic resistance propagation in the framework of urban wastewater reuse, in order to assess the relevant environmental and public health risks.
This pioneering project aims at substantially contributing to the relevant EU wastewater policies, by providing valuable contributions for guidelines and recommendations for sustainable wastewater reuse. Novel protocols/systems for the identification of relevant micro-contaminants have been and/or are being currently developed in the framework of ANSWER, particularly for wastewater, for soil where irrigation is taking place, groundwater, in crops and in surface water that serve as storage before reuse. Moreover, soil amendment strategies are being explored, in order to reduce their bioavailability during irrigation. The fate of A&ARB&ARGs during activated sludge treatment is being also investigated and modelled, while innovative and advanced wastewater treatment technologies are being evaluated for their potential to minimise the risks related with these micro-contaminants in downstream environments. Relevant Emission-Limit Values (ELVs) will be determined, essential for the development and implementation of regulatory frameworks. The outcomes of the ANSWER project will contribute to understanding the fate and transmission of antibiotics and antibiotic resistance from wastewater to the environment and humans, through soil, ground/surface water and crops.
