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As many of you probably know, waterways are being
polluted by phosphates, nitrates and sulphates caused by
the human element of the environment.
This is probably not a huge problem where the sewers
are well maintained, but in areas where the sewers are
not well maintained this causes algae
blooms and
poisoning of wildlife. I must also mention that run off
from agriculture is a major pollutant - which this idea
does not address.
The idea is to direct domestic greywater systems
(kitchen/bathroom sink, shower/bath,
dishwasher/clotheswasher etc) into a sediment tank
before releasing the waste water into the sewer.
This is specifically how this invention would work:
1. drain water is aerated by a technique similar to
homogenization (used in milk) under strong ultraviolet
light (causing ozone to form). The effect would hopefully
be the further oxidization of any reactions that can be
oxidized further. This would also kill any microbes.
2. Mix iron (recycled from the scrap yard) powder (also
possibly carbon and aluminum - cheap and plentiful) to
cause precipitation of any compounds that can be
precipitated. Application of electrolysis would also be
interesting to experiment with in the development
phase.
3. Collect sediments in government issued sludge
containers. The sludge would then be recycled to extract
phosphates, sulphates and nitrates for use in industry.
The overall effect of this would be fewer bioavailability
nutrients entering the waterways and thus have effect
on conserving our environment.
1.greywater 1
http://www.greywater.co.za/
a company that has explored a similar idea [codrakon, Aug 31 2009]
2.greywater 2
http://www.greywater.com/
another similar idea [codrakon, Aug 31 2009]
3
http://www.sei.se/n...phosphate-rock.html
global phosphate shortages [codrakon, Aug 31 2009]
4
http://www.theaustr...60117-30417,00.html
more global phosphate shortages [codrakon, Aug 31 2009]
Brac System
http://www.bracsystems.com/products.php
Something like this? [energy guy, Aug 31 2009]
sphere fountain
http://www.allisonarmour.us/aqualens/
an alternative way of aerating and oxidising reactions in water. just put a really bright uv light in the middle of this sphere. mirrors beyond the water sphere to reflect light back and make more ozone, [codrakon, Sep 01 2009]
Phosphate Pollution
http://www.youtube....watch?v=g0tvk7Xg8cs
From detergents [codrakon, Sep 01 2009]
phosphates in laundry detergent (or not)
http://www.treehugg...hate-free_soaps.php
[FlyingToaster, Sep 01 2009]
Dwindling Freshwater
http://www.azcentra...7vip-gober0817.html
trouble is headed our way [codrakon, Sep 02 2009]
[link]
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Hm... doesn't have the ring of a new idea. |
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once again, this device is not commercially available,
additionally the idea that a government program that
issues 'sludge' containers to collect and recycle
domestic household waste is not established. |
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also how many recycling systems use waste
carbon/iron/aluminium to recover even more
recyclable materials? |
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[-] the effort is going into the wrong place: in a city, rather than buy and install a million of these plants and keep them supplied, why not just build one treatment plant ? Bear in mind that graywater helps move blackwater to the treatment plant. |
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Still, if you can find a way to do it without having to supply every single household with flocculants I'll bun it. |
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I think that recycling in a big plant may be easier
in some respects, due to the volume of
precipitates and the economy of scale that can be
achieved by recycling large amounts of waste. |
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I also think that upgrading sewerage treatment
plants to recycle the waste might also be quite
expensive. Also the waste received by sewerage
treatment plants contains large amounts of organic
material, which complicates the process compared
with recycling the relatively high concentrates of
phosphates, nitrates and sulphates in the
domestic sludge containers - because it is
concentrated it is easier to recycle, perhaps. The
high concentration of (hopefully insoluble) metal
salts (iron/ aluminum/ potassium/ sodium) might
also make for commercially viable extraction. |
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To reduce the amount of organic waste (entering
the processing system) such as hair, food particles
and the odd tooth and wedding ring, the
homogenizer that sprays the waste water onto a
ceramic plate could also be a means to separate
larger solids (which will generally be organic in
greywater). |
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If one applies electrical charge and rotational force
and perhaps even ultrasound to the greywater it
might cause the colloids to form large enough
particles to precipitate, thus negating the need
for chemical flocculants. according to Wikipedia,
aluminum and iron are already used widely as
flocculants. to address the need for the 'flocculant
powder' I suggest that household would be issued
with the certain ration of flocculants each time
their sludge container is emptied by the recycling
company. |
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On this note, not all houses have gardens that
they can redirect greywater into, and having done
this myself it is not always a good idea. too many
nutrients can and will kill plants and animal life in
the soil. secondly I think complexes and
townhouses might join plumbing together to have
a neighborhood size extraction units. this could
even scale to suburb size units if necessary,
provided that the concentrate sludge remains
viable to recycle. in this case, each household
does not need to have a supply of flocculants. |
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The (cleansed) water that is released into the
sewer from the domestic sediment plant would
still help the blackwater reach the sewerage
processing plant. |
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Since I'm all for neighbourhood-sized treatment plants I'm not sure why I keep wanting to cover your idea with piscine skeletons, but there we are. |
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Note that if you have heavy metals in your bathwater, there's something wrong with you (err no offense 8/7) |
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As far I can make out [FlyingToaster] heavy metals in
bath water would be in very low concentrations and
has nothing to do with this idea. |
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Perhaps I should have defined greywater [^]1,2. Since
I addressed all of the issues you raised I would have
preferred a bun. Anyway there you go. |
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huh, I was sure I read "heavy metals reclamation" in there somewhere. |
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Regardless, the only thing you have to worry about, if you're worried about it at all, is soap residue: phosphates and nitrates I think. |
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ps: not my bone up there. |
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My apologies. The point is to extract the soap
residues, before they reach the general sewage
lines. In the hope of economically recycling the
phosphates and other stuff. |
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The reason is to prevent the build up of
phosphates and other greywater compounds in
the waterways and prevent algal blooms and
animal deaths. |
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Check [^]3,4 for information about commercial
phosphate shortages. |
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I think this has been baked in different ways before. The most common is a septic tank (Granted it doesn't feed into the city wastewater system, but its the same principal. Living machines pretty much do the same thing. |
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Lastly, a Canadian company called Brac makes a similar system. |
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This system is more that the links mentioned here. It
is perhaps about a communal way of saving water,
and preventing pollution, in a way that will counter
depleting phosphate resources. |
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The domestic sludge might provide a rich
concentrate raw material for further recycling. |
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it just seems very labour intensive to remove chemicals which can leach into the soil naturally without problems (in household amounts) and indeed are fertilizer. Regarding "phosphate shortage", phosphates are banned in laundry detergents in quite a few countries <link>. Now if we're talking heavy urban areas with 40-storey apartment buildings and no green... well that's a different level of concentration. |
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On the other hand, an apartment complex could probably not only support it's own wastewaters (/garbage/recycling) treatment facilities, but actually save money doing so, by working a deal with local government. |
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You certainly can't direct partially or untreated water back into the ground. It fills up aquifers with toxic crap in short order. |
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I'm pretty certain that reticulated sewerage is a superior idea to the one postulated here. What isn't yet widely done, is to adequately address the recycling of precipitates and solids for agricultural uses. |
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[UB] assuming by reticulated sewage you mean,
the conventional system - if not, please link. |
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i think that since most of the crap that goes down
the drain in terms of detergents is recoverable to
some extent. additionally, with greywater
especially, it is possible to reuse the water (-minus
detergents) for applications that do not require
drinking water. with some further purification it
can probably be safe to drink. |
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so the idea proposes a way to economically recycle
the concentrated chemicals we put into
reticulated sewage - reducing pollution and
decreasing our dependency on limited resources.
if it is indeed worth it then additional benefits
such as a partly reusable freshwater supply and an
overall lower environmental impact per household
(nationwide) would probably result in a better life
for us all. |
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I meant reticulated sewerage. Sewerage is a network of sewers. |
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Sewage, on the other hand, is the waste liquid and material that sewerage carries away to be dumped or treated. |
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This is a distinction lost on many English speakers, it seems. |
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If you care to do your research, you'll find that many city municipalities around the world treat and recycle sewage for drinking water. It's remarkably commonplace and safe. |
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yes i am aware that sewage treatment plants
produce potable water. |
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i am suggesting that between our domestic
outlets for greywater and the main sewer, that it
could be feasible to syphon off the greywater and
treat it separately to the water in the sewer. |
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if such treatment of grey water took place in
household, neighbourhood (such as an apartment
complex) and suburb level, perhaps it could sustain
a recycling plant, that would recover the relatively
high concentrations of chemicals that could be
cycled back into industry (or agriculture). |
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as a bi-product, a local freshwater supply would be
in the vicinity of the greywater treatment plant. |
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i think that early versions should be designed into
newly erected buildings, like [FlyingToaster]
suggests. |
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