Occupational health risk assessment for wastewater treatment and reuse in Kanpur, India

Type
01A - Journal article
Editors
Editor (Corporation)
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Parent work
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
Special issue
DOI of the original publication
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Series number
Volume
20
Issue / Number
12
Pages / Duration
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MDPI
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Abstract
The treatment and reuse of wastewater for irrigation can lead to occupational health risks for sewage treatment plant (STP) workers and farmers. Sanitation Safety Planning (SSP) is an approach which can be used to measure and mitigate these risks. This paper explores what impact a novel secondary treatment process, consisting of an integrated permeate channel (IPC) membrane combined with a constructed wetland plus, has on the occupational health risks compared with the existing activated sludge wastewater treatment process and reuse system in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh. A mixed methodology was used, which included key informant interviews, structured observations, and E. coli analysis. This data was used to undertake semi-quantitative risk assessments following the SSP approach. The novel secondary treatment increased the number of health risks which the STP workers were exposed to, but the severity of the risks was lower. This was due to the differences in treatment processes and infrastructures. The number of health risks for the farmers decreased both in number and severity. For their children, the severity of the health impacts decreased. These changes were due to the increase in the microbiological quality of the irrigation water. This study highlights the potential of using a semi-quantitative risk assessment to assess the occupational health impacts of using novel treatment technologies.
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ISBN
ISSN
1660-4601
1661-7827
Language
English
Created during FHNW affiliation
Yes
Strategic action fields FHNW
Publication status
Published
Review
Peer review of the complete publication
Open access category
Gold
License
'https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/'
Citation
Babalola, F. M., Breitenmoser, L., Furlong, C., Campling, P., & Hooijmans, C. M. (2023). Occupational health risk assessment for wastewater treatment and reuse in Kanpur, India. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20(12). https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20126072