Earth Day 2019: How retailers are embracing sustainability

In the middle of the Sahara desert on the western border of Algeria, refugee camps hosting tens of thousands of people rely completely on humanitarian aid: Water, food, and other basic supplies come in on trucks. Trash, on the other hand, doesn’t really leave; until recently, all the waste from the camps was dumped nearby in the desert into an ever-growing pile of plastic. But at a new recycling center at one of the camps, refugees are now turning that plastic trash into furniture and other products that they can use.  Precious Plastic, an organization with a DIY recycling system developed by a Dutch designer who wanted to make recycling more accessible, helped set up the center after the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, put out a call for solutions to help with the waste challenge at the camps.

Sewage effluent is a major global driver of freshwater pollution, but conventional treatment technologies to mitigate sewage pollution are energy intensive, expensive and frequently provide sub-optimal pollutant removal performance. In this regard, integrated constructed wetlands (ICWs) have emerged as a potential alternative, cost-effective, natural treatment for sewage effluent, but major questions remain about their seasonal effectiveness and long-term ability to capture, retain and cycle nutrients with sufficient efficiency to reliably replace conventional treatment technologies. Furthermore, there is growing environmental concern regarding the inability of conventional treatment process to remove endocrine disrupting plasticizers and laundry microplastic fibres, and research is required to assess whether ICWs have increased potential to mitigate these plastic pollutants. Integrating hydrological, biogeochemical and analytical sciences, the student will investigate the potential of ICWs to provide an environmentally and economically sustainable alternative to conventional wastewater treatment technologies for the reduction of nutrients, plasticizers and microplastic fibres in sewage effluent. This field and laboratory intensive project will see the student lead on a comprehensive 18-month field sampling campaign, collecting water, sediment and plant materials from across numerous operational ICWs and their neighbouring river channels at hourly-to-monthly resolution. In the laboratory, the student will be trained in the operation of a wide range of state of the art analytical equipment, enabling them to deliver a novel, comprehensive and quantitative evidence base on the effectiveness of ICWs at treating sewage effluent. The student will gain extensive and highly valuable data analysis experience as well as opportunities to engage with a wide range of water, environmental and industry stakeholders. The professional training gained will provide rewarding career opportunities in conservation, regulation, research and industry organisations.