How to Improve the Efficiency of Your Wastewater Treatment Plant?

How to Improve the Efficiency of Your Wastewater Treatment Plant?

Posted by David Cannon on 19th Nov 2019

With the global water crisis gaining attention, there is an increasing pressure on manufacturers across industries to treat their wastewater efficiently. Owing to the stringent regulations imposed by state mechanisms, it has become necessary for water treatment plant users to boost their treatment system’s efficiency. Also, if these treatment systems are not working efficiently, there can many risks involved such as costly repairs, huge fines due to the high amount of effluents in treated water, and so on. To avoid all these, it is important that water treatment plant operators take necessary steps to improve the efficiency of their wastewater treatment plants. How it can be achieved? Read the post to find answers.

Tips to Improve the Efficiency of Waste Water Treatment Plant

The combination of obsolete pumping equipment and inefficient water management processes can be fatal due to the aforementioned reasons. Here is how you can achieve better efficiency and improve your cost savings.

1. Observe the Signs: Many times, wastewater treatment operators miss out on some vital signs due to ignorance. However, gaining an understanding of the underlying signs will help them utilize their water treatment assets effectively and achieve the desired results. They need to act upon if they notice any of the following:

  • Increased Amount of Effluents: This is perhaps one of the common visible signs, which inform the water treatment efficiency has reduced. The state regulatory agencies in the US and across the world are devising stringent laws pertaining to discharge limits on municipal and industrial wastewater treatment plants. This is done to improve the quality of effluents released into the environment.
  • Increasing Operational Costs: Many plant operators perceive wastewater management systems as a bad investment. Although they spend huge amounts to ensure that discharge limits are met, they think of replacement or upgrade of systems as added costs. Against this, working with aging equipment can be expensive as they require regular repairs, maintenance, and may experience downtimes, too.
  • High Chemical Costs: Chemicals are being used in large amounts of treat the wastewater. When wastewater treatment plant operators try to meet the limits set by the city, they end up using chemicals, which leads to high chemical bills. This, when combined with other operational deficiencies, may contribute to increased operational costs.

2. Set a Benchmark: How can you achieve efficiency, if you have no goals to follow? This goes true for any business or process, including wastewater treatment. Setting a benchmark will help wastewater operators as well as managers identify the performance gaps as well as develop strategies to mitigate these gaps.

3. Conduct a Detailed Audit of Pumps and Other Accessories: Most wastewater treatment technologies in use today utilize some type of pump. Earlier, the pumps were designed based on the concept of peak flow in the plant. Most times, these pumps operate at variable flow, based on the demand. So, it is common to see oversized pumps in action. Then there are pumps that work at a constant speed and may use more water and demand more energy. So, it is important for plant operators to upgrade or replace obsolete pumps or the excessively big ones which consume more energy.

4. Employ Smart Technology: It is often seen that wastewater treatment plant operators tend to ignore smart technologies due to misconceptions such as high operational costs and lack of technical knowledge. However, in reality, these smart technologies are easy to use. They help identify water waste and energy waste trends and make informed decisions based on performance and insights.

All the above-discussed factors will help you improve the efficiency of your wastewater treatment plant; however, it is important that you make the right technology investment. To avail the maximum benefit of your investment, it is important that you source quality equipment from a trusted manufacturer or supplier like Cannon Water Technology. The company provides wastewater treatment equipment from industry-leading brands like Lakos, Stenner, Myron L, and so on.