Project Details

Project Delivery

Project Results

Discussion

Situation

In the food and beverage industry, the abattoir wastewater treatment plays a major role. Meat processing companies often produce heavily polluted wastewater. These are mainly organically contaminated. Fats and oils, but also blood and urine, which are produced during the slaughter process, are mixed into the wastewater. Without treatment, this wastewater can cause considerable damage to nature.

For this reason, a slaughterhouse in Bulgaria asked the ClearFox® team for a solution for abattoir wastewater treatment. As the Bayreuth-based company has a lot of experience in the food and beverage industry, the design of this plant was not a challenge. The wastewater is mainly generated during the cleaning of the work surfaces. In addition, the company planned to discharge the employees’ hygienic wastewater into the treatment plant. This results in increased COD and BOD₅, which are mainly present as non-dissolved substances in the wastewater.

Problem

The challenge with this project was the lack of space on the company premises. The company has a small outdoor area where the wastewater treatment plant was to be located. Therefore, the solution had to be particularly compact and easy to transport to the site. Furthermore, the wastewater is produced very irregularly. Due to the cleaning work, there are always inflow peaks that the wastewater treatment plant must compensate for.

Solution

For this project, the ClearFox® team designed a dissolved air flotation system in a 20-foot HC ISO Sea container. After screening, the wastewater flows into a buffer tank to compensate inflow peaks. The plant then continuously feeds the wastewater into the ClearFox® DAF. Via a polymer station, the plant mixes flocculants into the wastewater to bind all dissolved and non-dissolved substances. Highly fine bubbles cause the flocculated substances to rise and thus separate them as sludge from the clear water.

The ClearFox® DAF is an outstanding solution for wastewater treatment in the food and beverage industry. It shows its great potential especially for wastewater from slaughterhouses. The ClearFox® DAF is easy to understand and works automatically. Thanks to its efficient design, fewer chemicals and no mechanical scraper are required. This reduces operating costs to a minimum.

For this project, the ClearFox® team first tested the wastewater in the in-house laboratory. Based on the test results, the engineers adjusted the polymer addition to achieve the best possible cleaning performance. Afterwards, the responsible staff members took over the complete planning for the project, the construction of the wastewater treatment plant, the transport, the commissioning on site and the training of the employees.