Water reuse in the poultry processing industry: information and data requirements of the impact analysis for USDA FSIS regulatory development

摘要

Engineers in the arid region of Fountain Valley, California have a solution for water shortages: Reuse the water that is flushed down the toilets. "There is a yuck factor, but we explain to people the quality of water will end up being actually higher than what we already use," says Ron Wildermuth, spokesman for the Orange County Water District. That agency is collaborating with the Orange County Sanitation District to build a 600 million dollar sewage-purification system. When completed over the next 20 years, the system is expected to be the largest of its kind in the world. Boosters of the project for Orange County, a suburban metropolis of Los Angeles, say the new system will bring the wastewater up to drinking-water standards. With the project estimated to cost 600 million dollar over its life, the treated sewage water will cost around 420 dollar an acre-foot to produce. (An acre-foot of water - the volume that would cover one acre to a depth of one foot or 325,851 gallons of water - is theaverage amount used by a family of five over the course of one year.) Existing groundwater supplies cost only about 150 dollar an acre-foot, while imported supplies cost from 200 dollar to almost 500 dollar (Carlton, 2002). Therefore, fresh water is clearly a valuable resource that should be managed in cost-effective ways: the production of waste water should be minimized, while promoting the maximum use of recycled water, or the optimal reuse of water before or after the reconditioning processes.