A company that specialises in plastic recycling has benefitted from a new water treatment chemical contract with Veolia Water Technologies.
By utilising Veolia’s Hydrex 62925, the recycling plant has made significant annual savings on water treatment chemicals. Simultaneously, by switching to Veolia Water Technologies’ organic coagulant, the time taken to carry out the dosing has been reduced by 15% and is now considerably safer for the team of plant operators.
The customer, a plastic recycling facility in the North of England, had an increasingly problematic Effluent Treatment Plant (ETP) prior to its partnership with Veolia Water Technologies. The site was utilising Polyaluminium chloride (PAC) and caustic soda to process wastewater; however, this was generating increasingly large amounts of sludge, which the facility was struggling to deal with.
Furthermore, due to the nature of the PAC and caustic dosing systems installed at the site, the chemical products were supplied in powder form. Not only are these chemicals expensive and difficult to obtain, but they also present a significant COSHH (Control of Substances Hazardous to Health) exposure risk for the plant operator. As a result, operators were required to wear a full chemical suit to protect against possible chemical burns and the complexity of the dosing process was negatively impacting the facility’s efficiency.
Brian Jones, Business Development Manager at Veolia Water Technologies, undertook a site visit and realised that the process could be optimised in key areas with a simple chemical switch.
Firstly, by replacing the powdered chemicals with Hydrex 62925, the dosing process has been made safer. The liquid Hydrex 62925 only requires the operator to wear gloves and eye protection, as opposed to a full chemical suit.
Secondly, thanks to the simplified dosing process of Hydrex 62925, the amount of labour required has also been reduced. The operation has been calculated to take 15% less time, allowing the plant operators more time to attend to their other duties. What’s more, the implementation of Veolia Water Technologies’ optimised chemistry has meant fewer deliveries of chemicals are required annually, further reducing the labour needed to keep the ETP running properly.
Finally, by switching to the cost-effective Hydrex 62925, the facility has been able to save a projected over £20,000 a year on chemical costs, with a potential saving of over £60,000 should the site implement plans to run the ETP for longer each day.
Further savings have also been achieved as the optimised ETP now produces >50% less sludge than before. As such, the site no longer needs to invest in an additional screw press to remove water from the sludge before it can be disposed of. This in turn has saved the customer the CAPEX required to fit a screwpress.
A representative from the plastic recycling facility commented:
“Since the implementation, the change has been significant. We have reduced the amount of sludge we have to deal with and our chemical usage, as well as improved safety on site for our water treatment operators. Brian did a marvellous job, we are very grateful for the changes that have had such a positive impact.”
