Evaluating Economic and Environmental Benefits of Water Reuse for Agriculture

The National Research Council identified quantifying the non-monetized costs and benefits of water reuse relative to alternative supplies as a critical research need for advancing beneficial reuse of municipal wastewater. In many instances, the agricultural community has access to multiple water sources, including surface water, groundwater, recycled water, and other non-traditional supplies. However, each source is enmeshed within a complex and poorly quantified system of tradeoffs. A unified framework for understanding the economic, environmental, and social tradeoffs of using recycled water and other nontraditional supplies for agricultural irrigation remains a major knowledge gap. The magnitude of the need for this research will continue to grow as competing demands for limited water resources intensify. This project will conduct a comprehensive review and comparative assessment of benefits and costs associated with the use of recycled water and other non-traditional water sources for agricultural irrigation.

Originally funded as WERF project Reuse-16-06.