Study on the fate of viruses in wastewater and sludge treatment using membrane bioreactors and anaerobic digestion within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic

本研究旨在更好地了解在2019冠状病毒病大流行背景下，利用膜生物反应器结合厌氧消化进行污泥处理的废水处理工艺链中病毒的命运。为此，将对工艺流程进行采样和表征，并研究操作条件对工艺性能的影响。结果数据将用于在整个处理过程中对病毒灭活进行数学描述，从而可以优化该技术的设计和操作设置。此外，将进行膜完整性测试，最终确定关键控制点，并为工艺链设定关键控制极限，以满足其对病毒的最小设计日志去除值，从而确保公众健康和安全。在该项目完成后，合作伙伴组织H2O Innovation可以利用这些结果来提高其病毒去除技术的性能，或者提供技术去除能力的证据，从而提高其资源回收和循环利用过程的社会可接受性。此外，该公司将了解到膜完整性测试对确保公众健康和安全的重要性，从而允许在现有的废水处理场实施完整性测试策略，从而在市场上更具竞争力。所有这些都可能最终为H2O Innovation带来巨大的经济效益，并为加拿大带来社会、健康和环境效益。本研究产生的结果对加拿大或国外在水和废物处理部门制定循环经济战略的其他公司，包括技术提供商和顾问也有兴趣。

This research aims at better understanding the fate of viruses in wastewater treatment process chains using membrane bioreactors combined with anaerobic digestion for sludge treatment within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. To this end, sampling and characterization of process flows will be performed and the impact of operational conditions on process performance will be studied. The resulting data will be used to mathematically describe virus inactivation throughout the treatment process, which may allow to optimize the design and operational settings of the technology. Moreover, membrane integrity testing will be performed to eventually identify critical control points and set critical control limits for the process chain to meet its minimum design log removal value for viruses, thereby assuring public health and safety. Following completion of this project, the partner organization, H2O Innovation, can use the results either to improve the performance of its technology regarding the removal of viruses, either to provide evidence of the technology's removal capacity and hence improve the social acceptability of their resource recovery and recycling processes. Moreover, the company will have insights in the importance of membrane integrity testing to assure public health and safety, thereby allowing to implement integrity test strategies at their existing wastewater treatment sites and as such become more competitive in the marketplace. All of this may eventually lead to significant economic benefits for H2O Innovation, as well as social, health and environmental benefits for Canada. The results produced in this study can also be of interest to other companies in Canada or abroad establishing circular economy strategies in the water and waste treatment sector, including technology providers and consultants.