The main issue with the conventional technologies for wastewater treatment is the high energy and carbon footprint of these systems along with the low capacity of energy and nutrient valorization. FORWARD-WATER will develop and implement a revolutionary process for treating wastewater, which consists of pre-concentration using the spontaneously occurring FO process followed by suitable downstream processes to recover energy and materials.

These processes consist of anaerobic treatment to recover energy and chemical precipitation to recover nutrients. Through this novel approach, we will convert municipal sewage into a low-volume effluent characterized by high organic carbon and nutrient concentrations, thus increasing the efficiency of downstream recovery processes.