The world&#;s eight billion people create a lot of wastewater &#; another word for sewage &#; enough that the natural water purification process is insufficient on its own to remove the harmful chemicals that cause disease in not just people but flora, fish and wildlife.
Wastewater treatment removes contaminants and suspended solids from wastewater; this treated, potable water can then be dispatched back into the ecosystem free from man-made contaminants.
Why do we treat wastewater? Without treatment, the amount of wastewater in the environment would cause devastation. It does so, in fact, in developing nations: Globally, over 80 percent of all wastewater is discharged without treatment. This leads to mass illness and severe disruption of the food chain.
Untreated wastewater poses significant health risks, accounting for 1.7 million deaths annually &#;over 90 percent of those in developing nations1.
You can find more information on our web, so please take a look.
Untreated wastewater can also cause2:
The above diseases are seen not just in developing nations but in the U.S. as well. Wastewater treatment is one of the best defenses we have against stopping these diseases and saving lives.
When nitrogen, phosphates, or rotting organic matter pollute bodies of water in large amounts, the result is unusual plant growth. These plants then secrete toxins which leads to oxygen depletion. And that&#;s what causes so-called &#;dead zones&#; or uninhabitable aquatic ecosystems.
Untreated wastewater is toxic to non-aquatic animals, including people. But ingesting wastewater itself is not the sole problem. Upstream wastewater contamination poisons the food chain: Polluted algae contaminates the fish that eat it, which poison the bears that eat them, and so on.
Wastewater pollution is also responsible for what&#;s known as red tide3, a mass killing-off of aquatic animals that can pollute large volumes of water, making entire human-serving water systems non-potable.
The natural wastewater detoxification process is overloaded &#; there is simply too much sewage for nature to keep up with. Wastewater treatment helps to remove the waste and keep our ecosystem healthy.
Basic wastewater treatment occurs in three treatment parts: primary, secondary and advanced. The following infographic, Wastewater Treatment , from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) explains the basic operation of wastewater treatment.
As the above illustrates, modern pollution levels are so great that a single sifting process is seldom enough to make water potable.
The main goal of wastewater treatment facilities is to protect people, as well as local ecosystems, from toxic elements found in wastewater.
Water treatment facilities were designed to speed up the natural process of purifying water because the natural process can&#;t keep up with the amount of waste society produces. Without wastewater treatment and other recycling processes, everyday life would be considerably more hazardous; it remains so in developing nations lacking established wastewater treatment systems.
About the author: Megan Ray Nichols
Megan Ray Nichols is a STEM writer and blogger. More of her work can be found on SchooledByScience.com, and she can be reached at [ protected].
Industry 4.0 technologies &#; like artificial intelligence, internet of things sensors and big data analysis &#; allow for minute-to-minute data collection and machine automation. These technologies, which have already improved efficiency and automated processes in other industries like manufacturing, are now being adapted for wastewater treatment.
This tech offers several advantages over the last generation of plant management systems and can significantly improve many aspects of wastewater treatment.
Here are five benefits of automated wastewater treatment that every plant manager should know about.
Wastewater treatment is always a data-driven process. With legacy systems, workers need to manually collect water data, meaning plant administrators and analysts rarely have information that is both up-to-date and comprehensive.
Automated water systems are built on a network of robust data-collection devices. These devices provide minute-to-minute updates on water quality and equipment function. Many automated water software platforms are also designed with their own advanced analytics software &#; sometimes using cutting-edge technology like big data and artificial intelligence &#; to better store and analyze plant data.
Often, administrators working at plants without these systems may find their information is comparatively scattered, stored manually and generally harder to get a hold of for analysis. Better visualization tools and data collection methods provided by automated monitoring systems can prevent this issue.
If you want to learn more, please visit our website zhaoyang.
Constant and consistent data access also allows plant administrators and workers to remotely monitor the treatment process. Even when workers aren't or can't be on-site, plant administrators can still keep an eye on key indicators of water quality and equipment performance.
With access to comprehensive and minute-to-minute plan data, it's possible to optimize plant processes in completely new ways. By reducing the amount of labor demanded from water treatment workers and boosting plant efficiency, automated wastewater treatment systems can increase the amount of water that can be treated.
In one example, Lima, Ohio, was able to increase water treatment capacity at the city's main treatment plant from 53 million to 70 million gallons per day by upgrading to an automated distributed control system, and new historian software that provided administrators with data visualization and analysis tools.
They can allow plant administrators to quickly get a sense of how key water quality indicators have changed over time, or answer their own questions about plant performance without needing a background in programming or data analysis.
The combination of the remotely accessible equipment and minute-to-minute data visualizations allowed for several tweaks and changes that boosted treatment capacity &#; like remote troubleshooting and maintenance, which saved the plant hours in downtime.
Automated systems are often designed to interface with existing technology and provide plant administrators with better data about what equipment is working and what's not. As a result, these systems can help managers strategically modernize plants that depend on legacy systems.
Even though Lima's plant was originally constructed in &#; and the previous control system hadn't been upgraded since the s &#; plant workers were still able to fully upgrade the control system.
At a time when much of America's water infrastructure is starting to show its age, treatment plant managers need a solution to outdated equipment. Complete renovations are likely expensive and not practical in every case. In situations like these, automated systems can be a way to modernize old infrastructure and optimize legacy systems.
Energy use is one of the highest costs at any wastewater treatment plant. Upgrades to traditional systems can lower these costs, but they don't solve the problems posed by a lack of data about plant equipment and processes. Automated treatment systems can reduce the total amount of energy and water treatment chemicals that a plant needs to use in day-to-day operations.
Similarly, these automated systems can also reduce the amount of water that is lost during the treatment process, saving plants and their operators additional resources.
Automated systems can also lower a plant's number of overflows by providing plant staff with remote access to equipment and switches in the case of a flood. Often, during flooding, it's not possible for plant staff to quickly get to the plant or remain on-site. As a result, workers aren't able to restrict flow into the water treatment plant, which can result in costly and environmentally dangerous overflows. With automated systems, plant workers can remotely restrict plant flow, reducing the risk of an overflow.
Lowering the number of overflows can reduce waste and reduce the likelihood that the plant will need to pay fees or fall out of compliance with EPA regulations on wastewater discharge and overflows.
First pioneered in industry and manufacturing, predictive maintenance technology and techniques outfit plant machines and equipment with sensors that allow them to effectively monitor themselves. These sensors track critical operational info &#; like internal pressure, water flow rate and temperature &#; to alert plant managers to damage, wear or impending equipment failure.
This advanced notice can allow administrators and managers to schedule repairs before this happens, saving costly downtime or machine replacement.Some systems can even use electrical controls to automatically shut down operations that are approaching failure, possibly saving equipment and downtime later on.Automated systems are also designed to work with both legacy and cutting-edge wastewater treatment equipment. They can be effective both in plants that need to keep an eye on older machinery, as well as newer, untested systems.
Automated wastewater treatment systems are poised to make treatment plants more efficient than ever before.
These systems can provide several benefits for plant managers, including remote monitoring, better data, a more efficient process and access to predictive maintenance strategies. Automated systems may also be a way to modernize legacy equipment and infrastructure that is beginning to show its age and will need to be updated shortly.
Contact us to discuss your requirements of Wastewater Treatment Tanks. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.