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PURE – Project on Urban Reduction of Eutrophication
Reduction of especially phosphorus load is urgently needed to improve the state of the Baltic Sea. Project PURE (Project on Urban Reduction of Eutrophication) implements one of the most cost effective and quickest ways to tackle eutrophication: it enhances phosphorus removal at selected municipal wastewater treatment plants in the Baltic Sea region. PURE partner water utilities aim to achieve an average annual concentration of 0.5 mg phosphorus / litre in outgoing wastewaters. This is the level recommended by the HELCOM Baltic Sea Action Plan to reach a good environmental status of the sea.
The phosphorus removed from the wastewaters stays in the wastewater sludge and it is essential to prevent this phosphorus from leaking to the watercourses. Sludge management is challenging to many wastewater treatment plants. Thus PURE also maps, develops and shares good practices and innovative techniques to handle the wastewater sludge.
PURE encourages the waste water treatment plants in the Baltic Sea region to follow those exemplary ones that already reach the HELCOM recommendation in phosphorus removal.
The total budget of the PURE project is 3.2M Euros of which 2.6M go under the ERDF budget and 600 000 under ENPI budget. The project is co-financed by the Baltic Sea Region Programme 2007-2013.
Outputs and results:
- annual reduction of 300-500 tons of phosphorus loading to the Baltic Sea via investments in Riga, Jurmala and Brest
- technical audit reports and investment plans for each of the partner waste water treatment plants (WWTPs)
- publication of good practices in sustainable sludge handling at municipal WWTPs
- user friendly database on urban nutrient inputs and waste water treatment in the region for municipalities, WWTPs and authorities
The PURE-partners are:
UBC EnvCom (Lead partner), John Nurminen Foundation (investment coordinator), HELCOM (communication coordinator), water companies of Riga, Jurmala (Latvia), Brest (Belarus), Szczecin (Poland), Kohtla-Järve (Estonia) and Lübeck (Germany), and cities of Gdansk (Poland) and Mariehamn (Åland, Finland).
For more information, please see: http://www.purebalticsea.eu
Last updated 22 September 2011