Wayne State University and City of Detroit team up to improve community water service maintenance and treatment
Wayne State University has signed a Memorandum of Understanding to form an official partnership with the City of Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) to use the Water Works Park pilot plant for research in developing alternative methods of water treatment. The current scope of the project includes developing a curriculum for environmental science, biomedical sciences and engineering that focuses on hands-on exposure to water treatment plant operations. "This partnership demonstrates Wayne State University's commitment to educational opportunities that allow our faculty and students to have a positive impact in our community," says Dean of the College of Engineering Farshad Fotouhi.
Named initiatives include the investigation of the utility of existing treatment trains, including ozonation, to process nontraditional raw water constituents, including chemicals of emerging concern (CECs), which are considered for potential future regulation. CECs that will be evaluated for treatment options include pharmaceuticals, personal care products and endocrine-disrupting compounds. In addition, the partnership will allow evaluation of the life-cycle costs of treatment plant and distribution/transmission operations under a variety of scenarios, giving direct input into asset management opportunities. A special focus will be on the consideration of treatment plant modifications to reduce the carbon footprint of the plant, which makes a direct contribution to the energy management initiative. The pilot plant will be used to analyze the technical feasibility of these modifications.
Several concepts will be explored, including implementation of new monitoring technologies for nontraditional chemical contaminants that can evaluate water samples at the intake and during critical water treatment steps. One specific idea involves using existing animals as biosensors - for example, if the zebra and quagga muscles are systemically removed at the water intake, they could be collected and evaluated to see if there are biomarkers (genes turned on) that indicate a history of certain contaminants running through the intake.
# # #
Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 380 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.