Research and education consortium within wastewater and sludge management

Cooperation between researchers and practitioners

VA-kluster Mälardalen is a Swedish research and education consortium within the water and sanitation area. The consortium was established in January 2010 and its members cooperates within wastewater and sludge management. The members are universities in the Mälardalen region ten wastewater utilities in and around Mälardalen and two research institutes. The consortium receives support from the Swedish Water & Wastewater Association, SWWA, and is a part of the project programme for universities launched by SWWA. The consortium is also financially supported by the wastewater utilities in the region.

The foremost focus of the consortium is to support the work at the wastewater treatment plants in the region and in the whole of Sweden. The objective is to contribute to more efficient wastewater and sludge management systems with respect to energy and resource utilisation.

Our strength is that wastewater treatment plants and researchers are working together with the challenges the industry is facing. The collective expertise among members of the cluster within measurement, control and modeling with application to wastewater treatment is unique in Sweden.

Education for the future

The consortium will continue to educate future professionals in the water and sanitation sector. The goal is to controbute to a world-class water and sanitation education both on undergraduate level and postgraduate level as well as for professionals working within the sector. We also wish to highlight the water and sanitation area as an important and interesting topic with several applications in society and for environmental protection.

Every year about twenty master theses are performed within the cluster, and approximately twenty PhD students are currently active within the water and sanitation area.

Members

Universities:

• Uppsala University
• KTH Royal Institute of Technology
• SLU Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
• Mälardalen University
• Lund University (IEA)

Wastewater utilities:

• Stockholm Vatten
• SYVAB
• Käppalaförbundet
• Uppsala Vatten
• Mälarenergi
• Eskilstuna Energi och Miljö
• Norrköping Vatten
• Tekniska Verken in Linköping
• Örebro municipality
• Växjö municipality

Research institutes:

• IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute
• JTI – Swedish Institute of Agricultural and Environmental Engineering

Focus areas

With its broad competence, VA-kluster Mälardalen covers the whole system from wastewater treatment to nutrient recycling and our strength is the possibility for researchers and process engineers at the plants to jointly face future challenges of the wastewater industry. Also, the collective competence among the consortium members within measurement technology, modelling and control with application to wastewater treatment is unique in Sweden.

VA-kluster Mälardalen is performing research within resource efficient wastewater treatment and sludge management with special emphasis on:

• Handling of new restrictions on discharge of nitrogen, phosphorous and BOD
• Monitoring, automatic control and optimisation
• Sustainable reuse of nutrients and organic material on farm land
• Biogas production
• Management of persistent pollutants in wastewater
• Reduced discharge of climatic gases

The meeting place

VA-cluster Mälardalen has created a new regional meeting place where wastewater issues can be discussed within the industry by activities such as:

• Meetings
• Postgraduate network
• Workshops
• Newsletter
• Homepage