Water scarcity is pushing the government, industries and researchers to the development of new strategies for water and wastewater management. An approach aimed at the optimization of the water use and minimization of effluent generation was developed at the Centro Experimental ARAMAR (CEA), a nuclear research facility, located in the State of Sao Paulo,Brazil. Bench scale tests followed by a pilot plant treating effluents from some nuclear research facilities have shown the results leading to the conclusion that the effluent zero release concept is feasible. Based on the gathered data, a project of an integrated effluent treatment system focusing on water recovery and environmental effluent release reduction has been developed.