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Drink more recycled wastewater

There is no room for squeamishness in the face of the world’s growing water shortage — three steps could vastly improve the image of reused water for drinking.
  1. Cecilia Tortajada

    1. Cecilia Tortajada is a senior research fellow at the Institute of Water Policy, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore, Singapore.

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  2. Pierre van Rensburg

    1. Pierre van Rensburg is strategic executive for urban and transport planning at the Department of Urban and Transport Planning, City of Windhoek, Namibia.

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Drinkable water is becoming increasingly scarce. Population growth, pollution and climate change mean that more cities are being forced to search for unconventional water sources1. In a growing number of places, drinking highly treated municipal wastewater, called ‘reused water’, has become the best option — and, in some cases, the only one (see ‘What is reused water?’).

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Nature 577, 26-28 (2020)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-03913-6

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