Wastewater utilities, stormwater managers, and water remediation companies all play vital roles in protecting our water resources. Phosphorus removed from polluted waters and from municipal effluents conserves our water resources and protects biodiversity; that extracted from biosolids safeguards against its overapplication to land and potential downstream consequences. And all of that phosphorus can be recycled for reuse.

The Sustainable Phosphorus Alliance has set goals for achieving greater sustainability in this sector that include:

• Selectively remove/recycle more phosphorus from wastewater, biosolids, and sewage ash.
• Improve transportability of biosolids by pyrolyzing/drying/pelletizing them and optimizing transportation logistics. Exporting biosolids from phosphorus-replete watersheds to phosphorus-deplete ones can reduce local phosphorus overapplication and consequent water pollution.
• Improve stormwater management to prevent phosphorus loading of waterways via leaf litter, pet waste, road salts, and lawn and turf fertilizers.
• Remove/recycle more phosphorus from polluted waterways in an environmentally sensitive manner.
• Expand participation in water quality trading platforms to help develop efficient markets for phosphorus recovery.

The Alliance has developed a state-by-state landscape analysis of biosolids and manure land application regulations as a resource for the phosphorus management community. This information is available alongside various contextualizing datasets on our graphical, online tool, called GIS-P. Learn more about the tool from this talk at our Phosphorus Forum.

You may also be interested in our webinars on water quality trading and wastewater treatment technologies, as well as a Phosphorus Forum talks on regulatory challenges with recycling phosphorus in organic residuals and industry efforts to establish nutrient recovery targets.

The membership of the Sustainable Phosphorus Alliance invites organizations in the Water and Wastewater Treatment Sector to participate in our activities to further the sector goals.