Reduce Backwash Sludge
Randy McIff, a water treatment expert at ATS Innova, discusses how you can reduce backwash sludge at your water treatment plants.
From the Video:
Randy McIff: My name is Randy McIff, and I’m the Director of Water and Waste Water Treatment with ATS. I’ve been a water treater for over 30 years, and I’ve worked in the industrial and municipal sides of business, both pre and post-treatment. Reducing backwash sludge is something that people deal with, especially as plants get bigger. The key thing to reducing backwash sludge is to not put as much solids in. When you use alum, for instance, for every pound of alum you’re using, you’re adding a half a pound of sludge, regardless of how dirty your water is. If you’re using ferric chloride, the number is similar.
There are coagulants that are very strong in charge that don’t have that kind of dosage need. You won’t need to dose near as much, but the molecular weight is so strong, it will give you either zero or next to zero, as far as the amount of solids you’re adding to your backwash. Then having to treat that backwash, the days of not worrying about backwash sludge are gone. I guess the question is why are you using the same old coagulant?
