VelRay X helped a grease recycler cut its wastewater hauling costs by 80%
A California grease recycler was spending over a million dollars annually on trucking wastewater. Installing a VelRay X unit at the front of a filtration treatment train vastly reduced the amount of water requiring removal.
20,000 gallons of wastewater a day, all of it on a truck
The plant produces 20,000 gallons of wastewater a day, which translates to about 7.3 million gallons a year. All of it had to be trucked out to a wastewater treatment facility – every day, four trucks traveled about 600 miles total to haul the water away.
Every trip costs money: the receiving plant's processing fee, insurance and liability, driver payroll, tires and diesel.
A filtration train could shrink the wastewater volume. But wastewater from a grease recycler carries heavy suspended solids and fats, oils and grease (FOG), and those are what clog filters, foul membranes and shut filtration trains down.
The fix: take the solids out first
The plant installed a three-stage train, with a VelRay X unit at the pre-treatment stage.
VelRay X can remove suspended solids from water that carries high levels of FOG. From there, superfiltration and reverse osmosis stages then receive water they can handle, so their filters and membranes don't foul and the train doesn't trip offline.
Results
The feed water carried 17,000 mg/L of suspended solids and 1,400 mg/L of FOG. The produced water came out clean.
Parameter | Feed water | Produced water | Reduction |
TSS | 17,000 mg/L | Not detected | 100% |
FOG | 1,400 mg/L | 1.2 mg/L | 99.9% |
TDS | 11,000 mg/L | 182 mg/L | 98% |
Source: AFI field data, California grease recycler. Feed water compared with final produced water from the full train.
VelRay X did its part at the first stage. In samples pulled before and after pre-treatment, suspended solids 20 microns and larger dropped 96%.
That is why the stages behind it ran without unplanned shutdowns, even with high FOG in the water.
80% less wastewater on the road
Fewer truck trips cut every associated hauling cost: transport, processing fees, insurance and liability, payroll, tires and diesel. Together they add up to more than $1.1 million a year.
Before | After | |
Truck trips per day | 10 | 2 |
Wastewater trucked per day | 20,000 gal | 4,000 gal |
Wastewater trucked per year | 7.3 million gal | 1.46 million gal |
Source: AFI field data, California grease recycler.
Same wastewater volume, fewer hauling trucks
Eight of every ten gallons no longer ride a truck, and the plant keeps more than $1.1 million a year it used to spend hauling wastewater. It started with one VelRay X unit at the front of the train, stopping solids so the downstream stages could operate as intended.
