China’s water-scarce cities to reach 25% wastewater reuse by 2025.
During the past decades of rapid development in wastewater treatment, China has accomplished the transition of wastewater treatment from underdevelopment to an industrial powerhouse. China accounts for 21% of the world’s population but only has 6% of the world’s freshwater resource, and it also has the largest amount of sewage discharge.
Rapid urbanization and industrialization have created enormous challenges to China’s municipal wastewater treatment quantity and quality because the amount of municipal wastewater treatment is directly proportional to the urbanization rate. China’s urbanization rate has increased from 36.22 % in 2000 to 59.58 % in 2018.
China aims to bring the utilization rate of recycled water in water-scarce cities at the prefecture level and above to over 25 percent by 2025, according to a government guideline.
The guideline, issued by the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, and the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, states that China should do more to conserve water and improve the efficiency of its sewage treatment.
China will also build 100 green and low-carbon benchmark plants for sewage treatment by 2025, according to the guideline. ■
Sources:
- Journal of Water Process Engineering, Vol 53, July 2023. https://www.sciencedirect.com/…/abs/pii/S2214714423002271
- Xinhua, 2023-12-29. https://english.news.cn/…/b0d964ecb8454e08943a2a…/c.html