What do you do with used water in your house? You might be one of those people who doesn’t give the subject much thought, so you simply let it flow down the drain. If you’re more conscious about it, you might hook up your washing machine to your toilets, so that used water from the wash can be used to flush. Or maybe you installed pipes guiding your kitchen drain to your garden, so dish water can be used to irrigate plants and flowers.
We have varying views towards environmental conservation. Some of us are mildly aware of the necessary measures, so we put our trash in the right recycling bins. They’re colour-coded, so it’s easy enough. Others go as far as composting in the backyard, and only buying tissue or notebooks that are manufactured from recycled materials.
Domestic recycling occurs on a small scale, at least at the individual level. It can have a bigger impact if it’s undertaken as a community initiative or school project, because that way, it’s implemented en-masse. In this sense, commercial measures for wastewater filtration can have far-reaching results. That said, industrial wastewater management is often pursued for practical rather than ideological reasons.
Industrial plants are often located far from residential areas, sometimes in regions set aside for factories and similar activities. There are lots of reasons for this. It’s a security measure, because business owners want to control traffic in an out of the factory. This helps them protect their property and their trade secrets. Other times, it’s to fence off customers from excess noise, smog, or toxins. All these factors are regulated by municipal governments.
In the same way a factory can’t make too much noise, they’re required to use responsible waste management methods. They can’t just dump poisonous chemicals into the ground, rivers, or sewers. Government inspectors frequently evaluate manufacturers’ waste to ensure they adhere to set standards of toxicity.
Reduce reuse recycle
Before dumping their used liquids or solids, the manufacturer has to remove a set amount if impurities to make it suitable for disposal in the public sewer system. This important because water treated in the sewers makes its way back into society. After being treated, it may pass into gardens and farms, or be released beneath the ocean where it re-joins the universal water cycle, eventually getting back to us.
Sewage chemicals can destroy and disinfect the bacteria and toxins in human waste and food waste, but it can’t dissolve or destroy industrial toxins, so these have to be extracted before the wastewater gets into the sewers. If not, those poisons will get back into our systems intact. Environmental regulations penalise businesses that don’t abide by toxin elimination standards. They can be fined or even lose their licenses.
At the same time, managing wastewater and other forms of waste helps a manufacturer’s bottom line. Industries consume thousands of litres of water every day. This water has to be bought from municipal mains, or purchased from private sources. Some businesses have their own boreholes, or a system of tanks for harvesting rain water.
Depending on what the water was used for, it doesn’t have to be disposed after one use. Some of it can be repurposed for additional usage within the factory, saving money and resources. Modern devices in development can even harvest heat from wastewater, lowering your industrial utility bill.
Wastewater isn’t treated strictly for water conservation. Sometimes, conserving the solid by-product matters too. In food and beverage industries, this extracted solid can be repackaged as a different product and sold for profit. For example, vegetable starch can be resold as a food thickener or laundry agent, while fruit pulp can be sold as a dye ingredient, sweetening product, fertiliser, or animal feed.
Even when the separated solid waste isn’t re-used, efficient separation can save disposal costs. A solid waste cake occupies less space in a land fill. It also causes less rot and emits fewer harmful bacteria because they thrive in moisture, so they won’t reproduce or thrive in a dried out waste depository. On the other hand, if the waste cake is designated for incineration, its reduced bulk means it will burn more completely, release fewer emissions, and use far less fuel in the process.