Cities and Municipalities can save a Great Deal of Energy on Waste Water Treatment with HACH LANGE Instrumentation

More than 10,000 waste water treatment plants in Germany’s cities and municipalities consume a lot of energy, accounting for nearly 20% of the power consumption of all public utilities. These facilities consume nearly 4,400 gigawatt hours of electricity per year and they emit some 3 million tonnes of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) annually. This volume of emissions could be reduced by one third without making any major additional investments. HACH LANGE practice reports have shown payback periods of only a few years.

A new research project headed by the Federal Environment Agency (UBA) demonstrates the measures, at waste water treatment facilities, that can benefit the climate. All without negative impact on purification capacity and operational safety. Water Treatment Optimisation Solutions WTOSTM by HACH LANGE is a combination of an advanced control system, process instrumentation and validation monitor to realise the results of the UBA study.

HACH LANGE offers process instruments for all recommended application areas:

• Aaeration control by ammonium content ensures excellent energy savings. The ammonium
electrodes [NH4D sc] are cost effective for plants < 10.000 EW.
• Improved control of internal re-circulation by nitrate measurement [NITRATAX plus sc] and
control of return sludge [SOLITAX sc] by inflow and/or sludge level [SONATAX sc] measurement in clarifier reduce
the energy consumption.
• TSS [SOLITAX sc] increase of primary resp. excess sludge has a big influence on the energy balance.

The key results of the research project Steigerung der Energieeffizienz kommunaler Kläranlagen (Enhanced energy efficiency in waste water treatment plants) can be found at http://www.umweltbundesamt.de/wasser-und-gewaesserschutz/abwasser/fg-energie.htm