By Lucas Elsbernd on March 26, 2025
Category: Blog

Challenges and solutions for sustainable wastewater management

Sustainable wastewater management focuses on closing the loop on resource usage during wastewater treatment, creating a system where waste is minimized by resource recycling and reuse. By integrating efficient treatment processes and technologies, communities can minimize environmental impact while improving long-term water quality.

The 3Rs of sustainable wastewater management
  • Reduction. Energy consumption in wastewater treatment plants is often associated with the magnitude and type of pollutant load. This, in turn, influences the treatment methods and technologies used in a plant. Energy use intensity ranges from less than 5 to more than 50 kBtu/gallons per day. Lowering high-energy usage and the associated carbon footprint of wastewater treatment are key to sustainable wastewater management. Innovative technologies, such as using a photovoltaic system to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions, are being explored to enhance the sustainability of wastewater treatment processes.
  • Reuse. Wastewater reuse or reclamation is a sustainable practice of reusing municipal, sewage and industrial wastewater after treating it to meet fit-for-purpose specifications. Recycled water can be used for irrigation, agriculture, landscaping, municipal water supply, power plants, refineries, mills, factories, concrete mixing and other purposes.
  • Recovery. Recovering nutrients from wastewater enables the local and renewable production of fertilizers, reducing the discharge of nutrients into water bodies. Biosolids, a nutrient-rich organic byproduct of domestic sewage treatment, are repurposed for land application, helping achieve the sustainability goals of wastewater treatment.

Significant challenges to sustainable wastewater management include aging wastewater infrastructure, lack of funds, stringent regulations and policy interventions. In this blog post, we explain some challenges that come with effective wastewater treatment and planning and strategizing for sustainable wastewater management.

Planning for sustainable wastewater management​

Let's look at some of the key challenges of sustainable wastewater management.

So, how can communities overcome these challenges to develop a sustainable and environmentally friendly wastewater management model? The following table highlights the core planning elements, including potential solutions to develop such a model.

Developing solutions for sustainable wastewater management
  • Identifying sustainability goals. A community’s sustainability priorities can include improving compliance, reducing energy or overall infrastructure costs, addressing wet weather impacts and others. The sustainability goals should align with and reflect the priorities of utility and community sustainability.
  • Developing potential strategies for each sustainability goal. Sustainability objectives should be identified while ensuring they are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely (SMART). Potential strategies for each sustainability goal should be identified after analyzing baseline performance. 
    Let’s say the sustainability goal is to manage runoff effectively when it rains and the objective is to reduce projected wet weather combined sewer collection capacity needs by 10%. The combined sewer overflow capacity needs should be determined after analyzing the past and anticipated precipitation event flows.
    Potential strategies may include deploying green infrastructure alternatives that meet the 10% objective.
  • Assessing the benefits and total lifecycle cost of each potential strategy. Once alternatives are identified, they should be assessed against the sustainability criteria, evaluating their benefits and full lifecycle costs. Examples of sustainability criteria can include cost-effectiveness, ecological and economic impacts, greater energy efficiency or self-generation of energy.
  • Developing a financial strategy. Once an alternative has been finalized, all project capital costs and operations and maintenance costs should be considered with the potential impact of new infrastructure projects on overall costs and revenue.  

Communities often struggle to develop sustainable wastewater management solutions and secure funding for green infrastructure projects. Partnering with an expert can help your community plan for projects and achieve successful outcomes.

How Fehr Graham can help communities plan sustainable wastewater management​

At Fehr Graham, we have helped communities strengthen wastewater infrastructure since the 1970s. From planning, designing and engineering wastewater solutions to helping communities secure funding, we are committed to preserving the environment through effective and sustainable wastewater management.

To learn about how Fehr Graham can help communities plan sustainable wastewater management, contact us or call 563.927.2060.

Lucas Elsbernd, a Professional Engineer and Senior Project Manager, finds innovative solutions to challenging water and wastewater projects. He manages municipal, commercial and industrial planning and design projects in the water resources environment. He fosters a positive client experience and collaborates with leaders throughout the firm on project pursuits and technical issues. Lucas is one of the firm’s water and wastewater experts. He has a strong technical knowledge of water and wastewater treatment design and construction engineering. Reach him at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

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