CAPTURE Newsletter June 2023

The book Biological Wastewater Treatment: Examples and Exercises is now available also as an OPEN ACCESS publication at IWA Publishing eBooks platform.

CAPTURE professor Eveline Volcke and her Phd student Laurence Strubbe contributed to Chapter 10 on Bulking sludge and Chapter 11 on Aerobic granular sludge. Also CAPTURE Professor Di Wu from the Ghent University Global Campus in Korea participated to this book.

EIP Plasma Physics Innovation Prize

CAPTURE prof. Annemie Bogaerts and Georgi Trenchev (CTO of D-CRBN) were awarded by the European Physical Society with the 2023 Plasma Physics Innovation Prize, for their pioneering research on plasma-based?CO2?conversion by experiments and modelling, and the creation of a successful spinoff (D-CRBN).

DEEPER BLUE

DEEPER BLUE is a recently started project, involving several CAPTURE members. The project aims for?reuse of WWTP effluent as drinking water, after extensive treatment using membrane filtration (RO). The reuse will be couples to?underground buffering?of the produced drinking water, the so-called?Aquifer Storage and Recovery?(ASR) principle. Waterunie, a subsidiary of water companies Farys and De Watergroep, executes this project at the WWTP Aalst in collaboration with Aquafin and supported by CAPTURE. This initiative fits within the programme of the VMM within the?Blue Deal?of the Flemish Government.

A first step in the project is the drilling of the ASR well to a?depth of 275m, into the rock of the Massief van Brabant, to the target aquifer 'de Sokkel'. If a good aquifer can be tapped, it will be used as a?"winter-summer battery for water". Later,?one million liters of reused water?will be produced daily and in wet periods of water surplus, the water will be?injected in the ASR well?(= Aquifer Storage). In this way, the project builds up a strategic stock of injected water, which can be?pumped back up in dry periods of water scarcity (= Aquifer Recovery).

Podcast recommendations

Cheers to CO2

In the second episode of 'Cheers to CO2', we listen to prof. Jennifer Wilcox about 'Exploring the CO2 Emissions Terms: Understanding the Science and Solutions'. Jennifer Wilcox is the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary (PDAS) for the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

Discover the main concepts such as Carbon Neutral and Carbon Negative Emissions, Carbon Utilization, Carbon Capture and Storage, and more.

Skift meetings

CAPTURE member Karl Vrancken from VITO made an episode for the Skift Meetings Podcast together with Brecht Putman from VISITFLANDERS. In this episode they talk about Circular Economy and how destinations benefit from circularity.

Karl also focuses on the importtance of the fact that your event or conference has a story behind it that allows for community building.

PFAS in Vlaanderen

A Podcast Series that has been online for some months but still a very hot topic in the daily news. In addition to the 3M site in Zwijndrecht, Flanders has dozens of hotspots with PFAS contamination. In this series Karl Vrancken considers the impact on people and the environment, how we should deal with it and how to work towards a PFAS-free future. Francesca Van Thielen interviews several people involved every month. Good to know: these series is published in Dutch.

Research in the picture

Fien Waegenaar , a PhD student of CAPTURE professors Nico Boon and Bart De Gusseme and mainly working on the BIOSTABLE project, was asked to perform in a video for 'Kennismakers', a series of stories from, by and about researchers'. In this video she explains what drinking water research is all about.

This clip was made with the support of Research Foundation Flanders - FWO .