A brief history of sewage treatment industry and the status quo of water pollution treatment in China

The demand for sewage treatment is accompanied by the birth of the city. After hundreds of years of changes, urban sewage treatment technology has developed from the initial primary treatment to the current tertiary treatment, from simple disinfection and precipitation to organic matter removal, nitrogen and phosphorus removal to deep treatment and reuse. Every development and progress of sewage treatment has provided an essential driving force for the development and progress of mankind. With the rapid development of China's national economy and the deepening of reform and opening up, urban productivity continues to improve, the number of urban population also continues to increase, the future of China's sewage discharge will also increase, therefore, the demand for sewage treatment will also further expand today here Xiabian specially edited a brief history of the development of China's water pollution treatment and industry status quo. China's earliest history of sewage treatment was from the 1920s, and the establishment of Shanghai North District sewage treatment plant in 1923 opened the prelude to modern Chinese sewage treatment.

The Shanghai North Sewage Treatment Plant is the first municipal sewage treatment plant in China. The plant covers 0.84 hectares and has a daily treatment capacity of 3,500 cubic meters. The tail water is discharged into Shajing Port. In the following years, the Eastern sewage Treatment Plant and the Western sewage treatment plant were built successively, with a daily treatment capacity of 17,000 cubic meters and 15,000 cubic meters, respectively, and after treatment, the tail water was discharged into the Huangpu River and Suzhou River respectively. But since then, no new sewage plants have been built in China and few drainage pipes have been built. By 1949, the total length of drainage pipes in the country was only 6034 kilometers, and rain sewage was mainly discharged by open channels or rivers.

After the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, China's sewage treatment industry has experienced preliminary development, mainly concentrated on the construction of dirty and bad old urban sewage collection pipes, sewage interception, urban black and smelly rivers and lakes renovation. The famous comprehensive renovation projects are Longxigou in Beijing, Chilong River and Sitong River in Tianjin, Zhaojiabin in Shanghai, Qinhuai River in Nanjing, and Huangxiao River in Wuhan. At the same time, China also built or started construction of a number of primary sewage treatment plants during this period. For example, Beijing Gaobeidian first-level sewage treatment plant, the daily treatment scale can reach 400,000 cubic meters. However, at the same time, domestic sewage treatment technology is still in a relatively preliminary stage, and more self-purification of water bodies or more primary water treatment methods are used, and sewage treatment is not taken as an important content of urban development, and there is no great development in technology, and it is still in a relatively backward situation.

The stage of sewage land use transformation began in the 1860s. Due to the further development of industry and agriculture, the concept of sewage agricultural irrigation was developed. At this time, the degree of sewage pollution was relatively low, and many water-scarce areas took sewage irrigation utilization as an experience to promote, such as the sewage irrigation area in the southeast suburbs of Beijing and the sewage irrigation area in Tianjin. In 1980, the amount of farmland irrigated with sewage directly reached 1.33 million hectares. It greatly improved the utilization efficiency of agricultural water resources in China, and effectively alleviated the problems of water shortage and sewage pollution at that time. In 1957, the then Ministry of Construction and Works and the Ministry of Agriculture and health and other departments included sewage irrigation in the national scientific research plan. In the 1960s, the relevant departments also held the "Asia, Africa and Latin America International Seminar on sewage Irrigation" in Beijing Gaobeidian Sewage Treatment Plant. In view of the risks of sewage irrigation, the National Conference on sewage Irrigation held in Shijiazhuang in 1972 put forward the policy of "active and prudent" sewage irrigation, and formulated provisional water quality standards for sewage irrigation to cope with the risks of sewage irrigation.

With the beginning of reform and opening up, China began to pay more and more attention to the development of sewage treatment industry, and in September 1979, China's first environmental law (referred to as the "Environmental Protection Law") was born, which marked that sewage treatment was officially under the management of laws and regulations. The "Environmental Protection Law" clearly stipulates several basic environmental systems in China, such as environmental impact assessment, "three simultaneous" and pollutant discharge charging system. In 1982, the "Sixth Five-Year Plan" officially designated "strengthening environmental protection and curbing the further aggravation of environmental pollution" as one of the ten basic tasks for national development. In 1984, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress deliberated and adopted the Water Pollution Prevention and Control Law. The state's policies in the fields of environmental protection and sewage treatment are improving day by day. During this period, China's sewage treatment industry began to integrate with international standards and achieve rapid development.