Energy Footprint Dynamics of Water Reclamation and Purification Processes During The Short-Term Periods

In the in water reclamation and purification processes, energy footprint has a dynamic behavior in diurnal period due to the variations of different environmental parameters (e.g. hydraulic load, pollutant load and temperature). Among the influence factors, pollutant load and hydraulic load have the highest diurnal impact on the energy footprint of the biological activated sludge process, while water temperature and solids concentration have the highest diurnal impact on the energy footprint of membrane processes (i.e. microfiltration and reverse osmosis). Advanced oxidation process has the lowest diurnal variations among the studied processes, due to the steady-flow operation condition and insignificant observation of diurnal variation among the component of concerns. Besides the diurnal energy footprint variations, the energy-associated carbon emission also is facing the variations among the portfolio of energy sources employed by power agencies in different hours of a diurnal period. During the night, the carbon intensity of the unit power generation is lower due to a higher contribution of clean-source energy; while during the daytime, fossil fuel-source power has a bigger contribution in fulfilling the power augmented demand.