Dr Declan Page, CSIRO. Credit: CSIRO.
By Rich Bowden
Australia’s premier science agency CSIRO has achieved a breakthrough, producing bottled drinking water from stormwater.
The bottled water, known as “Recharge” was taken from Salisbury, a city on the Northern Adelaide Plains in South Australia, where a combination of both natural filtration and scientific methods restored the water to drinking quality, said a CSIRO statement.
“This is an exciting demonstration of the value of stormwater and the drinking water that can be produced from it by using a combination of natural treatment processes and engineered methods,” CSIRO’s Water for a Healthy Country Flagship Urban Water Stream Leader Dr Peter Dillon said.
The natural processes included storage in porous limestone aquifer 160m below ground after being filtered through wetlands, said the news release.
“The stormwater was first treated by passing it through a reed bed or wetland,” Dr Dillon said. “This allows particles to settle. It was then injected via wells into a limestone aquifer for storage and months of natural slow filtration through the aquifer.”
Following this process, the water was then filtered through an activated carbon filter before undergoing microfiltration and ultraviolet disinfection. The “Recharge” water was rigorously tested before being declared fit to drink (see diagram below).
Dr Dillon said the research proved that potable water could be obtained in Australia in a number of ways.
“Compared to other common alternative supplies stormwater harvesting is cheaper, energy efficient and has a small carbon footprint,” he said.
“It also avoids the economic, social and environmental costs of building new dams for water storage and shows the value of urban aquifers.”
Schematic representation of the processes for turning stormwater into drinking water. Credit: CSIRO.
Could this process be used nationwide in the future?