Saving Energy by Linking Wastewater Plants

Do you know how wastewater plants work together to save energy? It's like having two factories side by side, sharing resources. In wastewater engineering, models called Activated Sludge Models (ASMs) help design and improve these plants. Recently, scientists created a system that connects a city's wastewater plant (mWWTP) with an industrial plant upstream (iWWTP). This joint control system (JCS) aims to save energy used for aeration, which is like giving oxygen to the wastewater to clean it.The scientists used a model called ASM3 + BioP for the city plant. They tested different scenarios to find the best settings for the new JCS. They also created a formula to predict the amount of nitrogen (TN) coming from the industrial plant. This formula, combined with an optimized aeration plan, became the JCS. When they tried this system in real life, they saw a boost in energy efficiency for nitrogen removal. It's like the two plants were communicating, helping each other work better and use less energy. Isn't that cool?