Evaluations of on-site wastewater reuse alternatives for hotels through water balance

Reusing of treated wastewater may contribute to solving water-related problems in touristic regions while contributing to sustainable tourism. Water saving potential of reuse will be mainly dependent on the size of hotel, size of irrigated landscaped area, length of irrigation season and servicing time of hotel. As the most appropriate solution is generally case specific and a long-term flow measurement for set of water consumption activities is needed, a model for common hotel configurations can contribute to use of treated wastewater at hotels. In this study, long-term monitoring data of two pilot hotels were assessed for water balance between the potential wastewater sources and demand for various individual reuse purposes. As a result, a decision tree for an optimized wastewater reuse is developed for the hotels in Mediterranean region. Our study suggests that to acquire the highest water saving, mixed domestic wastewater reuse may be the best suitable alternative for hotels which have more than 250 rooms, large irrigated landscaped area of bigger than 100 m(2) per room, and operated seasonally. However, for hotels which are operated throughout the whole year, having limited irrigated landscaped area and under design or construction, grey water reuse may be the best suitable alternative for the highest water saving. (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.