Effluent Treatment Plant – Improving Performance & Reducing Pollution
Effective management and control of the processes used for effluent treatment will help you to:
- Reduce your operating costs and thus increase profits.
- Achieve more effective compliance with legislation.
- Improve your company’s public image.
Reduce effluent treatment costs
This good practice guide aims to help companies reduce the costs associated with effluent treatment plant operation by at least 5%. As illustrated by the four Industry Examples at the back of the guide, some companies have achieved significantly greater cost savings by improving the performance of their effluent treatment plant (ETP). Although the guide is aimed particularly at the speciality chemicals industry, the advice given is applicable to many other companies operating an effluent treatment plant.
Before reviewing the operation of their ETP, companies are urged to take action to minimise the amount and strength of the effluent created by production processes. Producing less effluent in the first place will reduce the demands made on the ETP and thus save both money and effort.
A thorough understanding of the nature and properties of your company’s effluents is essential for cost-effective pollution control. The guide describes how to characterise your effluent streams and identifies key control parameters. It describes how to improve the performance of the most common treatment processes, including neutralisation, equalisation and activated sludge treatment. Advice on how to reduce sludge management costs is also given.
Improving performance
Improving the performance of the ETP will reduce your site’s operating costs and make it easier for your site to comply with its discharge consent conditions.
Sites discharging to sewer will also reduce their trade effluent charges.
Effective effluent management
The five steps to effective effluent management are:
- characterise all effluents produced on-site;
- implement a waste minimisation programme to reduce the volume and strengths of effluents;
- incorporate in-process conditioning and treatment, where appropriate;
- determine and install segregation facilities to tailor treatment options;
- optimise performance of ETP… request a copy of the full document >>
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