Wastewater fertigation in agriculture: Issues and opportunities for improved water management

and circular economy

Abstract

Water shortages are an issue of growing worldwide concern. Irrigated agriculture accounts for about 70%
of total freshwater withdrawals globally, therefore alternatives to use of conventional sources need to be
investigated. This paper critically reviews the application of treated wastewater for
agricultural fertigation (i.e., water and nutrient recovery) considering different perspectives: legislation,
agronomic characteristics, social acceptability, sustainability of treatment technologies. Critical issues
that still need further investigation for a wider application of fertigation practices include accumulation
of in soils, microbiological and public health implications, and stakeholders' acceptance. A techno-
economic methodological approach for assessing the sustainability of treated wastewater reuse
in agriculture is subsequently proposed herein, which considers different possible local conditions
(cultivated crops and effluent characteristics). The results showed that tailoring effluent characteristics to
the desired nutrient composition could enhance the process economic sustainability; however, water
savings have a major economic impact than fertilizers’ savings, partly due to limited P reuse efficiency.
The developed methodology is based on a practical approach and may be generalized to most agricultural
conditions, to evaluate and encourage safe and efficient agricultural wastewater reuse practices.

Graphical abstract

Introduction

Global freshwater consumption is constantly increasing: water shortages are rising worldwide, and
estimates show that by the year 2030 the global water requirement may be as high as 160% of total
available freshwater volumes (Ricart and Rico, 2019). Increasingly degrading freshwater quality linked to
overuse or lack of suitable treatment poses significant threats on the sustainability of water-intensive
crops cultivation (Sidhu et al., 2019), since agricultural irrigation accounts for about 70% of global
freshwater withdrawals (Alexandratos and Bruinsma, 2012). Population growth, climate change and
water quality deterioration issues are causing attention to focus on the evaluation of possible alternative
water sources for agriculture (Jeong et al., 2020).

Reclaimed domestic wastewater is nowadays considered a valuable alternative water source, able to
sustain many end-uses, that include not only process and drinking water, but also water for irrigation (UN
World Water Assessment Programme, 2017). Such reuse, however, is still quantitatively limited,
accounting for just about 0.5% of total freshwater withdrawals, and for 2.4% of treated wastewater
treatment plants (WWTPs) effluents in the European Union (EU) (Gawlik and Alcade-Sanz, 2014).
Southern European countries like Cyprus (Kathijotes and Panayiotou, 2013) and Malta (Chojnacka et al.,
2020) are more proactive in this field, with respectively 90% and 60% effluent reuse, due to water
scarcity conditions. Other water-stressed countries, such as Israel and Jordan, reuse in irrigation over 80%
and 90% of treated wastewater, respectively (UN World Water Assessment Programme, 2017;
Voulvoulis, 2018).

Reclaimed wastewater (RW) may be a reliable and controlled source of water and nutrients through
fertigation (i.e., combined irrigation and nutrient supply through RW) practices, contributing to a
potentially significant reduction of green-house gases (GHG) emissions compared to traditional
management approaches by avoiding wastewater overtreatment and subsequent nutrients addition
(Jiménez-Benítez et al., 2020). Treated wastewater, in fact, still contains valuable nutrients (N, P, K,
micronutrients), that can be recovered reducing the need for chemical fertilization with positive
environmental, economic and sustainability impacts (Chojnacka et al., 2020; Daneshgar et al., 2019;
Rossi et al., 2021). Moreover, agricultural reutilization of secondary effluents could reduce nutrient
environmental loads into surface waters (Chojnacka et al., 2020).

To provide quality-tailored water for specific reuses, selective approaches have been proposed: the “fit-
for-purpose” concept has gained significant attention, as it can reduce WWTP energy use and complexity,
avoiding unnecessary treatment steps (Capodaglio, 2020a; Cecconet et al., 2019). Furthermore, as N and
P removal increase the overall energy demand of wastewater treatment (Capodaglio and Olsson, 2020), a
reduction of energy and emission footprints could be achieved as well. Treated effluents may still contain
antibiotics, antibiotic resistant bacteria (ARBs), antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) and several emerging
pollutants, not removed by conventional treatments, including pharmaceuticals and organic toxic
compounds (Christou et al., 2017). As these compounds may be also present in surface and ground water,
assessment of whether RW fertigation could expose crops to a greater degree of accumulation than that
by irrigation by traditional sources is needed (Gavrilescu et al., 2015). Proper disinfection should be
assured to avoid effluents microbiological contamination (Leonel et al., 2016). Multiple barrier treatment
(i.e., proper sequence of complementary and increasingly selective processes) tailored to the desired reuse
goals could provide the required protection against undesired pollutants (Capodaglio, 2020a; J.
Schimmoller et al., 2015). Applicable solutions for municipal wastewater treatment in a fertigation
perspective should consider the best available technologies, with their specific advantages and drawbacks
(Rizzo et al., 2020; Trojanowicz et al., 2017).

In this review, the most recent advances in wastewater reuse for agricultural fertigation are summarized
and critically discussed, considering both legislative framework and available technologies. Agronomic
and social aspects are examined, including both effects on receiving soils and stakeholders’ acceptance. A
methodological approach to assess the techno-economic sustainability of effluent reuse is presented and
applied to a case-study. This paper aims to provide an updated overview of effluents agricultural reuse, to
promote safe RW fertigation practices, contributing to circular economy and sustainability visions.

Section snippets

Wastewater agricultural reuse: regulations and guidelines

A thorough survey of the available worldwide regulations/guidelines for RW agricultural reuse was
conducted: as the related legislative framework is constantly evolving, a highly inhomogeneous situation
was highlighted. Regulations differ concerning targeted parameters and threshold limits: e.g., coliforms
can be enforced in different countries as Total coliforms, E. Coli, or thermal coliforms (Brissaud, 2008).
In addition, thresholds may differ according to crop types, being generally stricter
Agricultural fertigation: issues and opportunities

Fertigation affects many different aspects of agricultural activities: these include agronomy, soil structure,
environmental impacts, economic sustainability, social acceptance. Agricultural irrigation and
fertilization largely depend on local conditions, such as climate, soil, and crops. RW characteristics and
volumes ought to be carefully balanced, as excesses of nutrients supplied by fertigation were linked to
reduced N use efficiency: increase in nitrate application from 30 to 50 g/m2

Treatment technologies for effluents’ fertigation reuse

In this section, some mainstream technologies for effluent treatment and agricultural reuse are
summarized, including low-impact ones such as constructed wetlands (CWs), and highly engineered
processes such as CAS, moving bed bioreactors (MBBRs), MBRs, anaerobic membrane bioreactors
(AnMBRs) and up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB), AOPs.

Techno-economic assessment methodology

In this section, a logical methodology to evaluate the techno-economic feasibility of wastewater

fertigation practices is outlined and applied to a relevant Italian case-study. Hydrological and economic
advantages of fertigation are determined considering water and fertilizer requirements of local crops, and
are compared to mineral fertilizers and agricultural water consumption under traditional practices.

Discussion and conclusions

RW fertigation could provide a suitable substitute to traditional irrigation practices, compensating for
freshwater shortages in agriculture and reducing mineral fertilizers application, with significant
environmental and economic benefits. In this paper, wastewater reuse practices were reviewed focusing
on existing regulatory requirements, technological solutions, agronomic and environmental aspects. The
latter are linked to the social acceptance of wastewater reuse schemes, but also to the

Credit author statement

Matia Mainardis: Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis, Investigation, Data Curation,

Writing - Original Draft, Writing - Review & Editing, Visualization. Daniele
Cecconet: Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis, Investigation, Writing - Original Draft.
Alessandro Moretti: Investigation, Writing - Original Draft, Visualization. Arianna Callegari: Writing
- Review & Editing. Daniele Goi: Supervision. Stefano Freguia: Writing - Review & Editing. Andrea
Capodaglio:

Funding information

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-
for-profit sectors.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that
could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the contribution of water utilities Irisacqua S.r.L. and CAFC S.p.A. for the
technical data used for the case-study methodology.