June 2020

COMPRESSED AIR Blower and compressor solutions provider Aerzen Rental’s local Derbyshire depot recently came to the aid of a food company that built a fruit juice production facility that generates wastewater effluents requiring treatment. A wastewater treatment plant expansion was also planned. However, unforeseen events caused a 4-month delay in its construction. Without the ability to treat the effluents, the new production line could not be operated, resulting in a loss of around 200,000 euros per week for the company. Rather than accepting the delay, the company chose to turn to a water Aerzen comes to the rescue of food company’s treatment project engineering company to find a solution. The water engineering company subsequently recommended Aerzen as its preferred provider of blowers. SBR principle Aerzen Rental also supplied fine bubble air diffusion grids, which can transform any tank into an aerobic treatment unit. Aerzen Rental’s water engineering customer called on the company to install a temporary treatment solution in an existing sludge storage tank that was onsite. For this process, it was decided to operate according to the principle of SBR (sequencing batch reactor), and this required the following equipment and operations: A generator was required to provide power to the pumps and blower Pumps and pipes to transfer process effluents to a buffer tank Pumps for transferring homogeneous effluents into the mud silo A 1500m 3 /h blower and 3 grids of fine bubble aeration diffusers Seeding of the basin with sludge that requires delivery with slurry trucks. The implementation of this temporary treatment project faced several safety and logistical challenges that were identified and mitigated by thoughtful planning and the technical expertise by the Aerzen team. The busy construction site required stabilisation as the soft ground would not support the heavy equipment required (generators, blowers), with scheduled deliveries and a crane supporting the lifting and placement of the aeration grids into the sludge tanks. All the heavy equipment and accessories were connected and tested by Aerzen Rental service engineers. The final biological treatment mass had to be sown. This was accomplished by using multiple deliveries of agricultural slurry. Aerzen Rental was therefore able to offer a complete package solution to the customer within a quick and cost- effective timeframe that successfully mitigated the issue and the impending costs. www.aerzenrental.com 46 HYDRAULICS & PNEUMATICS June 2020 www.hpmag.co.uk