CONSTRUCTED WETLAND TECHNOLOGY TO PREVENT WATER RESOURCES POLLUTION

Discharge of untreated waste waters into surface waters creates significant pollution in these resources. Wastewatersare most of the time discharged into seas, rivers and other water bodies without any treatments due to high treatmentcosts both in Turkey and throughout the world. Constructed wetlands, also called as natural treatment systems, are usedas an alternative treatment system to conventional high-cost treatment systems because of their low construction,operation and maintenance costs, energy demands, easy operation and low sludge generation. Today, constructedwetland systems are largely used to treat domestic wastewaters, agricultural wastewaters, industrial wastewater andrunoff waters and ultimately to prevent water pollution and to improve water quality of receiving water bodies. Inpresent study, currently implemented practices in design, construction, operation and maintenance of constructedwetlands were assessed and potential mistakes made in different phases these systems were pointed out and possiblesolutions were proposed to overcome these problems.