Bio-Sludge Management Systems

Bringing innovative solutions to the problem of municipal and industrial sludge management.

THE PROBLEM:

At large wastewater treatment plants, anaerobic digesters manage the biosolids produced at the plant, but as a municipality grows, these systems reach maximum operating capacity, and it is expensive to install new digesters.

Digesters can be susceptible to ammonia inhibition and toxicity, a serious problem when too much ammonia is in the waste stream, possibly even leading to a complete failure of an anaerobic digester.

At smaller wastewater treatment plants, anaerobic digesters may not be present and aerobic sludge is dewatered directly. However, traditional dewatering systems still produce a wet sludge that is often 80% water content! It is usually landfilled at high trucking and disposal costs.

Dewatered sludge from small wastewater treatment plants and even some larger plants struggle with pathogen regrowth in the biosolids that are hauled off for landfill disposal. This is an unfortunate problem that can endanger the health of entire communities.

THE SOLUTION:

Our system performs hydrolysis quickly and efficiently which eliminates the space required for a digester’s initial digestion step. In essence this provides more available space in the digester for processing. Existing systems can process a higher volume without new construction.

Our system, while hydrolyzing, also aims to remove a portion of the ammonia in the incoming wastewater. Recovered ammonia can be collected while the sludge heading for digestion is lower in ammonia content.

Smaller wastewater treatment plants can benefit greatly from hydrolysis of their sludge to provide a complete pathogen kill prior to dewatering. The hydrolyzed sludge will dewater significantly better using the plant’s existing dewatering technologies and the sludge will be safe for reuse options instead of just landfilling.

With a Vacom Hydrolyzer you can…

Enhance dewatering after aerobic digestion
Enhance production rate in an anaerobic digester
Capture ammonia
Eliminate pathogens

The Vacom Solution for Municipal Sludge Managment

Hydrolyzing Waste Activated Sludge

Vacom Systems specializes in the design of mechanical vapor recompression evaporators. However, Vacom has redesigned its proprietary technology and applied it to the processing of waste activated sludge (WAS). As an example: A 20 MGD Wastewater Treatment Plant may:

Dispose of the sludge solids at a landfill after dewatering through a belt press.
Use the Vacom system to create a Class A product that can dewater to approx. 50%
Recover ammonia as a valuable biproduct.