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Novel perspective for urban water resource management: 5R generation

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Abstract

Demand for water is expanding with increases in population, particularly in urban areas in developing countries. Additionally, urban water system needs a novel perspective for upgradation with urbanization. This perspective presents a novel 5R approach for managing urban water resources: Recover (storm water), Reduce (toilet flushing water), Recycle (gray water), Resource (black water), and Reuse (advanced-treated wastewater). The 5R generation incorporates the latest ideas for harvesting storm water, gray water, and black water in its several forms. This paper has briefly demonstrated each R of 5R generation for water treatment and reuse. China has the chance to upgrade its urban water systems according to 5R principles. Already, a demonstration project of 5R generation has been installed in Qingdao International Horticultural Exposition, and Dalian International Convention Center (China) has applied 5R, achieving over 70% water saving. The 5R offers promise for moving solutions for urban water scarcity from “hoped for in the future” to “realistic today”.

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Acknowledgements

This study was funded by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2017YFC0403400). The authors declare that the publication of this paper presents no conflicts of interest. All present affiliations of all authors are indicated.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Pollution Control and Resource Reuse, College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, 200092, China

    Lijie Zhou, Hongwu Wang, Zhiqiang Zhang, Xiaohu Dai & Siqing Xia

  2. Shanghai Institute of Pollution Control and Ecological Security, Shanghai, 200092, China

    Lijie Zhou, Hongwu Wang, Zhiqiang Zhang, Xiaohu Dai & Siqing Xia

  3. College of Chemistry and Environmental Engineering, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, 518060, China

    Lijie Zhou

  4. EnviroSystems Engineering and Technology Co., Ltd., Beijing, 100083, China

    Jian Zhang

  5. National Engineering Research Center for Urban Pollution Control, Shanghai, 200092, China

    Hongbin Chen

  6. College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Qingdao University of Technology, Qingdao, 266033, China

    Xuejun Bi

  7. Department of Civil and Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, CA, 94720-1500, USA

    Lisa Alvarez-Cohen

  8. Biodesign Swette Center for Environmental Biotechnology, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, 85287-5701, USA

    Bruce E. Rittmann

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  1. Lijie Zhou
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  2. Hongwu Wang
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  3. Zhiqiang Zhang
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  4. Jian Zhang
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  5. Hongbin Chen
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  7. Xiaohu Dai
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  8. Siqing Xia
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  9. Lisa Alvarez-Cohen
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  10. Bruce E. Rittmann
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Siqing Xia.

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Highlights

• 5R (Recover, Reduce, Recycle, Resource and Reuse) approaches to manage urban water.

• 5R harvests storm water, gray water and black water in several forms.

• 5R offers promise for moving solutions for urban water scarcity in practice.

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Zhou, L., Wang, H., Zhang, Z. et al. Novel perspective for urban water resource management: 5R generation. Front. Environ. Sci. Eng. 15, 16 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-020-1308-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-020-1308-z

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