IWAMA logo Interreg Baltic Sea Region EU logo Flagship logo
IWAMA aims at improving wastewater management in the Baltic Sea Region by developing the capacity of the wastewater treatment operators and implementing pilot investments to increase the energy efficiency and advance the sludge handling.

Activities

Project actions are distributed along three main fields of activities: capacity development, smart energy management and smart sludge management.

The capacity development activities will facilitate the uptake of the most recent knowledge on smart sludge and energy management in the region as well as use the lessons learned from the pilot investments. Project partners will participate in the onsite workshops, online webinars and form national knowledge based communities of the lifelong learning in each partner country. The communities will be represented on the international arena through the Baltic Smart Water Hub launched under one of the policy areas of the Union of the Baltic Cities (UBC) network. The Hub will utilize training materials and other tools developed during the course of the project, and provide opportunity to adapt new information and maintain continuous knowledge exchange with other water stakeholders in the Baltic Sea Region (BSR).

The smart energy and sludge management concepts will be developed and tested to improve the efficiency of wastewater treatment (WWT). The concepts will include a first of its kind common evaluation system for efficient energy performance and sludge treatment based on the wide range of data collected in the BSR. The pilot investments will be implemented for improved energy efficiency and enhanced nitrogen control as well as to increase the quality of sludge management and enhance the nutrient removal through sludge water treatment and new solutions for sludge hygienisation, stabilisation and drying.

More concretely, project activities will include:

  • Increasing capacity of WWT operators to unlock energy saving potential and to choose right sludge treatment technologies at both small and big scale by conducting series of international onsite workshops and online webinars, and producing a training materials package to be used by wastewater treatmetns plants (WWTP) outside the consortium;
  • Collecting WWT data to evaluate energy benchmark and sludge benchmark;
  • Developing audit concepts for smart energy management and smart sludge management (including common evaluation system of sludge treatment efficiency) in relation to efficient nutrient removal;
  • Piloting investments of novel energy nutrient-related technologies and management models for WWTPs at varying advancement levels;
  • Piloting investments to test advanced treatment systems for sludge water and innovative and cost-effective sludge treatment applications for different scale WWTPs;
  • Organising national and international dissemination events, and involving project partners and relevant stakeholders to make a commitment for improving the state of the Baltic Sea (Baltic Sea Challenge)

Results

Increased capacity of WWT operators in choosing and operating cost-effective wastewater treatment technologies will promote the uptake of the best available technology for energy saving and sludge handling in BSR. Wastewater sector professionals will be enabled to choose both most appropriate solutions for energy efficient nutrient removal on different technological levels, and most suitable sludge treatment technologies at both small and big scale. This will eventually result in more effective operation of WWTPs with reduced energy consumption, better integration of sludge treatment facilities to the main wastewater treatment processes, and improved effluent quality, which contributes to better environmental state of the Baltic Sea. The current forerunners in the region will gain visibility to motivate others to follow and implement modern solutions that goes far beyond the minimum legal requirements.

The knowledge gained at the international on-site workshops and webinars will be compiled in training materials package and used by partners and associated partners for further development of their organizations’ capacity. Based on the joint effort of transnational learning activities, data collection, benchmarking, audit and piloting outcomes, training materials will be translated to national languages and distributed for the use of the knowledge based communities and widely available in the launched Baltic Smart Water Hub.

IWAMA is a flagship project of the European Union Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region supported by the Policy Area Nutri. Flagship projects are a means to implement the actions in the priority areas of the EU BSR Strategy and serve as pilot examples. As part of the work towards cleaner Baltic Sea, Policy Area Nutri promotes Flagship projects with specific goals supporting the reduction of nutrient inputs to the sea to acceptable levels. These projects have important macro-regional impact and start from joint initiatives involving partnership from different Baltic Sea region countries.

Promotion materials

Funding

INTERREG Baltic Sea Region Programme 2014-2020

Project budget: EUR 4.6 million

ERDF funding: EUR 3.7 million

Duration

March 2016 – April 2019