ENERWATER has the potential to bring long-term social, economic and environmental benefits to Europe, where there is a growing concern on energy use in an attempt to mitigate climate change, optimization of energy efficiency and decrease the dependency of external energy imports. A strong political will has produced momentous plans, programs and new regulations to prevent energy misuse setting efficiency objectives and obligations (Directive 2012/27/EU on energy efficiency). Legislation is becoming more specific in order to address certain relevant sectors like such as buildings and households appliances. EU members have released national energy plans setting reduction objectives for 2020 and strategies towards their consecution (Energy 2020 - A strategy for competitive, sustainable and secure energy (2010), EU Energy Efficiency Plan 2011 (EEP)). At a particular level many companies and industries have also committed implementing energy management systems following voluntary standards (ISO 50001:2011 - Energy management systems). In this way, standards and legislation have become the main instrument to demonstrate commitment and address issues on energy efficiency.
The ENERWATER benefits are a consequence of achieving energy efficient wastewater treatment, which has a significant impact on the European population, as consumers of water, water bodies and the environment. One of the major costs of the water utilities, whether they are public, private or in any mixed partnership, is the energy expenditure. Even though the price of water provision is often regulated to a certain extent, the energy cost in wastewater treatment should in principle be transferred to the consumers.
Water governance is very heterogeneous in Europe. Nonetheless, the most common scheme features the public administration as responsible for the wastewater treatment as well as water distribution and production. In many cases, the administration delegates the public service through a leasing arrangement to a public or private operator with a tender repeated every 10/20 years and open to other operators. The ENERWATER method, aiming at being a standard energy audit tool, allows public administrations to benchmark, on a fair comparison basis, the energy efficiency of operators thereby providing an important criterion for the tender with the ultimate goal of reducing the water bill and the environmental impact.
The state of water bodies, in particular rivers, lakes, groundwater and coasts is a great concern for EU citizens as described repeatedly by Eurobarometer polls. The Water Directive (Directive 2000/60/EC) established a complete framework for protecting water bodies and sets the goals for wastewater treatment. The limits for discharge of N, P or organic matter represent a trade-off between the ecological requirements of the water bodies and the energy and resources needed to clean the wastewater further. ENERWATER gives the possibility of considering stricter discharge limits as it allows deeper control and understanding between tighter control over the effluent discharge and energy required to it.
Finally, EU citizens as water consumers will benefit of lower water tariffs and better information about the performance of wastewater treatment in their municipality or region as ENERWATER establishes the correct bases for comparison and operation of WWTPs.
