Does Water Recycling Reduce or Prevent Pollution?

Yes.  Traditional wastewater discharge has higher concentrations of pollutants than highly treated Recycled Water.  When higher-quality water is discharged to the environment, the pollutant loadings to groundwater basins, oceans, rivers, streams, and other water bodies are decreased.  Recycled water tends to have higher levels of nutrients and/or nitrogen which are of beneficial use for landscape irrigation.  As a result, Recycled Water use can also reduce the need to apply synthetic fertilizers in some cases.

In an industrial use context, Recycling Water prevents pollution.  Machines and equipment that use water, often produce wastewater that carry pollutants.  By Recycling wastewater, many of these pollutants can be removed before the water is introduced to the environment.