A single stage approach for designing water networks with multiple contaminants

Abstract The paper addresses water network consisting of water using processes ( w aste w ater r euse n etwork—WWRN) modeled as mass transfer operations with multiple contaminants. The objective is to minimize freshwater cost or usage but some structural requirements can be also included. The approach is simultaneous by optimizing WWRN superstructure model. Due to novel logical conditions and some valid simplifications the optimization model is mixed-integer programming (MILP) with small number of binary variables. It can be solved efficiently using widely available solvers even for large-scale cases. This paper presents basis of approach and example of application.