Grey water footprint assessment of domestic wastewater in Guangdong section of the Dongjiang River Basin

Abstract

Water pollution in river basins has become one of the main factors in restricting regional social-economic development. Water footprint assessment at river basin level is a hot issue in the research on water for sustainable development. In this study, the grey water footprint method was introduced for domestic wastewater assessment. The approach can effectively reflect the impact of water pollution on the amount of available water resources by evaluating the degree of water pollution from the perspective of water quantity. In order to verify the approach, the region of Guangdong section of the Dongjiang River Basin (GD-DRB) was selected as a case. Based on multiple pollutants (i.e., CODCr, NH3-N, BOD5 and TP), grey water footprint of the river basin was calculated. The results showed that the grey water footprint of domestic water in the urban area of the region was higher than that in the rural area. The total amount of grey water footprint in the region was 28.41 billion m3. The main pollutants in the region were phosphorus and organic compounds.