Efficient wastewater treatment is a prerequisite for successful water recycling in any industry as it makes way for better water management.

Water is one of the precious elements of nature. Its utility in keeping the human race alive and the commercial processes blooming is well-known. Hence from time to time effective practices are put in place to ensure that its core role in the ecosystem remains unchanged. And in the industrial realm water treatment plants and processes ensures that it stays that way.

Satya Narayana Y V V, Vice President, SFC Environmental Technologies Pvt Ltd points out “Different industries are following different procedures for water recycling. As water is becoming a critical resource, the industries are implementing water efficient technologies in their factories to reduce the water consumption itself. Segregation of effluent streams and differential treatment based on their characteristics is another method adopted for efficient treatment. Degree of treatment for recycling depends on the quality requirement in the industry. Hence, the water recycling plant schemes are planned to meet different quality requirements of water and there by optimising treatment costs.”

Efficient wastewater treatment is a prerequisite for successful water recycling in an industry. Wastewater treatment generally includes physico-chemical treatment processes for removal of chemical pollutants and biological treatment processes for treatment of organic pollutants. A tertiary treatment is put in place in the form of filtration, adsorption and membrane processes to produce recyclable quality of water.

Considering the recycling needs of the sewage, Sequential Batch Reactor (SBR) technology got popular in the present market. Many plants in the last 10 years are based on SBR technology. C-Tech, an advanced SBR technology is one of the popular technology implemented in India and world over. “Due to its advantages such as superior performance along with nutrient removal, lower land requirement, lower power requirement, higher process reliability, complete automation, modular design, etc., it became first choice for municipalities, city development corporations, contractors, etc. Membrane Bio Reactor (MBR) technology also produces very good quality treated water quality.” says Satya Narayana

However the higher cost of capital and membrane replacement has limited the use of this technology in smaller capacity plants. Conventional technologies like A2O process, MLE process etc also produces reasonably good quality treated water but with complex and longer treatment scheme and higher O&M cost.

Voltas, another player in the water treatment domain too has been putting technology to work. B. Ravindranath, Senior General Manager, Infrastructure Projects, Domestic Projects Group, Voltas Limited points out “Over the years, Voltas has come up with various innovative solutions to tackle the rising issue of water waste pollution. Apart from MBBR (Moving Bed Biofilm Reactor), SBR (Sequencing Batch Reactor) and ZLD (Zero Liquid Discharge), we use other technologies in industrial wastewater treatment as well, such as MBR (Membrane Bioreactor), UF (Ultra filtration), and RO (Reverse Osmosis). Depending upon the kind of project, we engage a technology and also team up with technology partner in the field to get best results.”

Voltas has successfully designed, built and commissioned water treatment, distribution, wastewater collection and treatment cum recycling system for Gujarat International Finance Tech-city (GIFT) Gandhinagar. In this project, both water and sewage treatments were wastewater. The treated wastewater is used for a District Cooling System (DCS) creating ZLD for the entire wastewater circuit. No fresh water was used. A DCS distributes cooling capacity in the form of chilled water from a central source via underground insulated pipelines to office, industrial and residential buildings to cool the indoor air of the buildings within a district. This system leads to 20-35 per cent less electricity consuming in the process.

The water treatment processes depend quite heavily on pumps, dosing and disinfection solutions for the entire water treatment process. When it comes to the different stages of water treatment secondary and tertiary treatment processes pose a main challenge of handling high inlet pressure.
Reliable water disinfection is crucial for the health and safety of us all. Substance removal in water treatment is an important step in this process, it consists of coagulation and flocculation and a removal step which is mainly filtration. This makes way for a range of intelligent products that dose the accurate amount of chemicals at the right time to ensure a safe and stable flocculation. This effectively reduces the amount of chemicals needed and increases not only the safety of the process but also of the personnel.

Needless to say these processes are required to comply with all relevant legal standards. In water treatment, stabilization is also an important step. Stabilisation is the process of pH control and balancing the water chemistry in treated water. These require the utility of precise and energy efficient dosing systems. “Grundfos offers a range of high-quality products and unique expertise. These include pumps, controllers and intelligent management systems which makes water quality control easy and reliable. At least 95 per cent of the components used for making Grundfos pumps can be recycled. The company provides comprehensive pump solutions with its applications across domestic, commercial, industrial, water utilities and many more.” says Saravanan Panneer Selvam, General Manager, Grundfos India

The different solutions provided by Grundfos include :-
iSOLUTIONS: This range of intelligent pump solutions were developed to look beyond individual components and to optimise the entire system. This system helps to control, monitor and optimise water systems even in the most demanding situations across commercial buildings, industry and water utility segments.
Demand Driven Distribution: This multi-pump solution enables the distribution of water as per the demand thereby helping to address leakage which is one of the largest sources of water loss. This offers precise amount of water flow based on its demand thereby contributing to significantly towards saving energy, water and operating cost. These solutions also enhance the lifetime of the pipelines and other downstream equipment through avoiding excess pressure in the system when not in need.

Remote Management System: A solution that was designed for smart cities to help monitor pump installations in commercial buildings, water supply networks, wastewater plants, etc. The system enables to track changes in pump performance and energy consumption to automatically generated reports to plan maintenance and reduce downtime.

Grundfos Lifelink solution a self-contained, energy- and cost-efficient, decentralised clean water delivery solution meant for developing countries. The Grundfos AQpure– a part of the Grundfos Lifelink family is a water treatment system optimised for producing drinking water in local communities, also in remote areas where establishing a stable, reliable and affordable production of drinking water from lakes and rivers can be extremely challenging

As far as purifying drinking water is concerned RO Purifiers are also quite popular. Although RO Purifiers remove dissolved impurities from contaminated water, RO purification has its own disadvantages. The water purified by RO process, is devoid of natural essential minerals. This RO purified water, without the essential minerals is acidic in nature and has a tendency to cause harm to human digestive system.

To overcome the limitations of conventional RO purification technology, Kent has developed a revolutionary Mineral RO technology. “The Mineral RO technology not only removes bacteria, viruses and harmful dissolved impurities from drinking water, but also retains the natural essential minerals in purified water, making the drinking water very healthy.” says Mahesh Gupta Chairman and Managing Director, Kent RO Systems Ltd.

As India surges ahead to realise its ambitious dreams of becoming a developed nation we will have to ensure optimal use of our resources including water. And the waste water treatment industry will have a big role to play in realisation of this dream.

At least 95 per cent of the components used for making Grundfos pumps can be recycled. The company provides comprehensive pump solutions with its applications across domestic, commercial, industrial, water utilities and many
Saravanan Panneer Selvam, General Manager, Grundfos India

Degree of treatment for recycling depends on the quality requirement in the industry. Hence, the water recycling plant schemes are planned to meet different quality requirements of water and there by optimising treatment costs.
Satya Narayana Y V V, Vice President, SFC Environmental Technologies Pvt Ltd

Depending upon the kind of project, we engage a technology and also team up with technology partner in the field to get best results
B. Ravindranath, Senior General Manager, Infrastructure Projects, Domestic Projects Group, Voltas Limited

The Mineral RO technology not only removes bacteria, viruses and harmful dissolved impurities from drinking water, but also retains the natural essential minerals in purified water
Mahesh Gupta, Chairman and Managing Director, Kent RO Systems Ltd.