{"title":"Minimal effect of raw water turbidity on operational energy use of drinking water treatment","authors":"Kenneth T. Quintana, Robert B. Sowby","doi":"10.1016/j.cscee.2025.101282","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The energy use of drinking water treatment plants (WTPs) depends on several variables, and while processes within the plant have been analyzed, the effect of raw water quality on energy use is less well studied. We analyze raw water turbidity, energy (electricity) use, and production volume in eight WTPs in Utah, USA, over a multi-year period. As expected, we find seasonal trends in energy use, turbidity, and production volume that correspond with watershed and water demand conditions. However, we find no significant relationship between influent turbidity and energy use. This is somewhat counterintuitive since one might assume that more turbid water is more difficult to treat. While higher turbidity does affect WTP operation (e.g., more chemical dosing and backwashing), it appears that the incremental energy use is minimal compared to the baseline. While consistently high turbidity might prompt the selection of a more energy-intensive process during WTP design, we conclude that, for a given WTP, typical operational fluctuations in turbidity do not meaningfully increase energy use.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":34388,"journal":{"name":"Case Studies in Chemical and Environmental Engineering","volume":"12 ","pages":"Article 101282"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2025-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Case Studies in Chemical and Environmental Engineering","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666016425001896","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"Environmental Science","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The energy use of drinking water treatment plants (WTPs) depends on several variables, and while processes within the plant have been analyzed, the effect of raw water quality on energy use is less well studied. We analyze raw water turbidity, energy (electricity) use, and production volume in eight WTPs in Utah, USA, over a multi-year period. As expected, we find seasonal trends in energy use, turbidity, and production volume that correspond with watershed and water demand conditions. However, we find no significant relationship between influent turbidity and energy use. This is somewhat counterintuitive since one might assume that more turbid water is more difficult to treat. While higher turbidity does affect WTP operation (e.g., more chemical dosing and backwashing), it appears that the incremental energy use is minimal compared to the baseline. While consistently high turbidity might prompt the selection of a more energy-intensive process during WTP design, we conclude that, for a given WTP, typical operational fluctuations in turbidity do not meaningfully increase energy use.