Here’s a New Year resolution you can stick to – achieving lower phosphorus limits
DATE POSTED: January 29, 2020
The New Year has come and gone, which means we all should be making good progress on achieving—or abandoning—our commitments for personal improvement in 2020. Maybe your treatment plant is also in need of improving some of its processes—such as phosphorus removal. This might be necessary to ensure consistent regulatory compliance, reduce chemical or sludge handling costs, or to hit a new, more stringent phosphorus limit.
Regardless of the reason, new, rare earth coagulant offers a fast, simple and cost-effective way to dramatically reduce phosphorus discharge that’s much easier to achieve than going to the gym four times per week or getting more sleep.
With ClariPhos™ rare earth coagulant, treatment plants can reduce phosphorus levels as low as 0.07 mg/L, using far less chemical and without the need to spend millions for a tertiary filtration system. That’s because the rare earth elements in ClariPhos, cerium and lanthanum, bind tightly to phosphorus to form a dense precipitate that settles up to two times faster than alternatives. This helps clarifiers operate more efficiently, lower chemical consumption, reduce sludge production by 30-50% and improve solids dewatering by 30% or more.
Easily switch to ClariPhos by simply replacing current coagulant
In most cases, plant operators can simply replace conventional alum or ferric coagulants with ClariPhos to easily and cost-effectively improve the chemical precipitation and settling of phosphorus. ClariPhos requires no special chemical feed equipment and will often work with existing feed pumps.
Dozens of treatment plants have already switched to ClariPhos to meet tough phosphorus limits and gain many other operational benefits.
In one example, a 3.4 MGD municipal wastewater treatment plant tested Neo rare earth coagulant for its ability to meet a new final water quality effluent limit on phosphorus of 0.075 mg/L.
The trial showed that the coagulant alone could consistently reduce phosphorus in the treated effluent to 0.036 mg/L. This result was far superior to what the plant was able to achieve with its conventional coagulant, ferrous chloride, which could only reduce phosphorus to an average of 0.5 mg/L. After switching to Neo rare earth coagulant, the plant was also able to avoid installing new nutrient removal equipment, at an estimated cost of $2.8 million, and reduce solids production by about 35%.
Learn more about ClariPhos rare-earth coagulant for phosphorus reduction and the operational benefits it can bring to your plant.
Contact us to discuss an ClariPhos test at your treatment plant.