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Throughout history, people have devised systems to make getting water into their communities and households and disposing of (and later also treating) wastewater more convenient. [1] The historical focus of sewage treatment was on the conveyance of raw sewage to a natural body of water, e.g. a river or ocean, where it would be diluted and ...
The development of water treatment and filtration technologies went through many stages. The greatest level of change came in the 19th century as the growth of cities forced the development of new methods for distributing and treating water and the problems of water contamination became more pronounced.
Water softeners, which use sodium ions to replace water-hardening minerals in water, were first introduced into the water treatment market in 1903. The theory of ion exchange involves replacing undesirable or potentially harmful ions with more desirable or harmless ones. This is implemented in domestic water treatment system as water softeners.
An example of a wastewater treatment system. Sanitary engineering, also known as public health engineering or wastewater engineering, is the application of engineering methods to improve sanitation of human communities, primarily by providing the removal and disposal of human waste, and in addition to the supply of safe potable water.
Dalecarlia Water Treatment Plant, Washington, D.C. Water treatment is any process that improves the quality of water to make it appropriate for a specific end-use. The end use may be drinking, industrial water supply, irrigation, river flow maintenance, water recreation or many other uses, including being safely returned to the environment.
The practice of water treatment soon became mainstream and common, and the virtues of the system were made starkly apparent after the investigations of the physician John Snow during the 1854 Broad Street cholera outbreak. Snow was sceptical of the then-dominant miasma theory that stated that diseases were caused by noxious "bad airs".
The management and maintenance involved in keeping the aqueducts flowing is well described by Frontinus, a general appointed by the emperor Nerva as water commissioner toward the end of the first century AD. He described his work on the distribution system in De aquaeductu published at the end of the first century AD. When first appointed, he ...
Water supply systems get water from a variety of locations after appropriate treatment, including groundwater , surface water (lakes and rivers), and the sea through desalination. The water treatment steps include, in most cases, purification , disinfection through chlorination and sometimes fluoridation .