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Abstract
Pilot-scale optimisation of different possible physical-chemical water treatment techniques was performed on the wastewater originating from three different recovery and recycling companies in order to select a (combination of) technique(s) for further full-scale implementation. This implementation is necessary to reduce the concentration of both common pollutants (such as COD, nutrients and suspended solids) and potentially toxic metals, polyaromatic hydrocarbons and poly-chlorinated biphenyls frequently below the discharge limits. The pilot-scale tests (at 250 L h−1 scale) demonstrate that sand anthracite filtration or coagulation/flocculation are interesting as first treatment techniques with removal efficiencies of about 19% to 66% (sand anthracite filtration), respectively 18% to 60% (coagulation/flocculation) for the above mentioned pollutants (metals, polyaromatic hydrocarbons and poly chlorinated biphenyls). If a second treatment step is required, the implementation of an activated carbon filter is recommended (about 46% to 86% additional removal is obtained).
Acknowledgments
The authors would also like to thank the various Flemish recovery and recycling companies – represented by COBEREC (www.coberec.be) – who gave their feedback on the ongoing optimization tests, with special thanks to scrap collecting companies A, B and C for providing the wastewater and their strong collaboration. Finally the interesting discussions with Els Verachtert from VITO (www.emis.vito.be) are greatly appreciated.
Funding
This project is part of the IWT-Tetra project REWARE (120118) and the LED H2O project. The LED H2O belongs to the LED network (www.lednetwerk.be) and is financially supported by The Flanders Knowledge Centre Water (Vlakwa vzw).