A heat wave that pushed California’s power grid to the limit, and the water system failure in Jackson, Mississippi, are just two examples.
Maria Khoza collecting water from the City of Tshwane municipality after a short closure of the a treatment plant caused by a sewage leakage in 2019.
Phill Magakoe/AFP/GettyImages
Are facilities that produce necessities like energy and clean water doomed to be ugly? Not when artists and landscape architects help design them.
Water purification at a modern urban wastewater treatment plant involves removing undesirable chemicals, suspended solids and gases from contaminated water.
arhendrix/Shutterstock.com
The solids from wastewater plants are usually dumped into landfills because they are contaminated with heavy metals. Now there is a way to remove the metals so the waste can be used as fertilizer.
Digital attacks can cause havoc in different places all at the same time.
Pushish Images/Shutterstock.com
Nuclear threats are serious – but officials, the media and the public keep a close eye on them. There’s less attention to the dangers of cyberattacks, which could cripple key utilities.
Aeration tanks at the Oaks wastewater treatment plant in New Providence, Penn.
Montgomery County Planning Commission
The ‘used water’ that flows from our showers, dishwashers and toilets isn’t a waste to engineers – it contains valuable materials. The challenge is recovering them and turning them into products.
Hull Peninsula and part of the Boston Harbor Islands National Recreation Area.
Eric Kilby/Flickr
A few decades ago Boston Harbor was one of the nation’s dirtiest water bodies. Now, healthier fish in the harbor underscore that a multibillion-dollar cleanup has succeeded.
Many towns in Newfoundland and Labrador have issues with disinfection byproducts created by chlorination.
(Shutterstock)
Cities all over the world are facing growing challenges to provide clean, reliable water. And many of the fixes, such as desalination plants, have a huge carbon footprint.
Big sewer pipes take all sewage to a place where it is treated. This place is called a sewage treatment plant.
Flickr/Dean Hochman
Lee Blaney, University of Maryland, Baltimore County
Ingredients from shampoo, sunscreens and other personal care products are turning up in water supplies. Some are toxic or cause hormonal damage to aquatic life, and could threaten human health.
Wastewater treatment systems around the world are hamstrung by outdated tests that don’t identify a growing array of pathogens or identify the sources of pollutants.
There are still concerns over the impact of upstream coalmines on water in the Warragamba Dam, a key part of Sydney’s water network.
AAP Image/Dean Lewins
The cutting of senior staff from WaterNSW, the body that oversees the safety of Sydney’s water supply, poses serious risks to Australia’s most complex water network.
Lead can linger in bones.
X-ray via www.shutterstock.com.
Lead might not be in paint or gasoline anymore, but since it doesn’t break down in the home or the environment it remains a problem throughout the U.S.
Academic Officer, Water Resource Management Unit lead, Institute for Integrated Management of Material Fluxes and of Resource (UNU-FLORES), United Nations University