A case for industrial laundries to make the transition from reacting to wastewater regulations to being proactive using pollution prevention and 'Design for Environment' methods

The U.S. National media are beginning to recognize the human health threats of Clean Water Act (CWA) noncompliance by industrial laundries. In theory, these companies are able to align themselves with CWA regulations by either treating their wastewater before it reaches Publicly Owned Treatment Works (POTWs) or by using proactive pollution prevention techniques. No previous work has been done to evaluate the business and environmental merits of these two different wastewater treatment approaches from the perspective of industrial laundries. We seek to understand how an industrial laundry can be proactively operated to lessen the financial impacts of wastewater treatment regulations. Using a case study and cross-case analysis, we evaluate theoretical models of industrial laundries using pollution prevention and industrial laundries under high and low enforcement schemes. Merits and challenges of these wastewater treatment approaches under these different scenarios are discussed. The research outcomes reaffirm the hypothesis that industrial laundries can make the transition from reacting to wastewater regulations to being more proactive using pollution prevention and Design for Environment (DfE) methods. During times of low enforcement, industrial laundries that adopt pollution readily maintain their advantages. Further research is necessary to quantify economic savings and wastewater pollution reductions gained in DfE relative to a pretreatment strategy.