Düsseldorf (Germany), May 30, 2016 – Nowadays, the need to process industrial and municipal wastewater in a cost-efficient, environmentally-friendly and resource-efficient manner is one of the most significant global challenges to be faced in competition for market shares and location advantages. Decision-makers focus on process efficiency and product quality as well as the need to reduce energy consumption as a cost driver for their installations.
GEA is a sought-after premium partner in the water/wastewater management growth market
Industrial and municipal wastewater treatment as a factor of competitionHigh-quality partner portfolio: Nijhuis Industries, Royal HaskoningDHV, CDEnviro and Cambi On course for success with energy- and resource-efficient GEA decanter technologies
At this year's IFAT 2016 in Munich, GEA is presenting itself not only as a leading systems provider of customized decanter solutions for water and wastewater treatment but also as a "preferred supplier" and premium partner for innovative globally operating environmental technology providers in the growth field of water management/water technology. These include in particular leading GreenTech companies such as the Dutch groups Nijhuis Industries and Royal HaskoningDHV, the Northern Irish company CDEnviro as well as Cambi from Norway. The range of applications of these high-quality GEA partners comprises process water and wastewater, water recycling and sewage sludge treatment as well as "waste-to-value" systems.
“The crucial factors in the decision to choose GEA as a certified 'preferred supplier' or premium partner were our process know how, the strong product quality of our decanter technology as well as our world-wide sales and service network”, says Joost Vliegen, Director Product Management Environmental Technology at GEA. “This guarantees our partners and their customers a reliable investment and a rapid return on investment over the entire machine and installation life cycle.”
GEA world-wide first “preferred supplier” for Nereda® process of Royal HaskoningDHV
With its natural wastewater treatment process Nereda® which has revolutionized the traditional municipal and industrial wastewater treatment process world-wide, the global player Royal HaskoningDHV has taken the decision to use decanter technology from GEA. In November 2015, the contracting parties signed a cooperation agreement which guarantees GEA the status as a “preferred supplier” for the decanter-based secondary sludge dewatering in the Nereda® process. The solution uses waterMaster decanters from the GEA ecoforce series, which ensure a considerable reduction in operating costs with their high sludge dewatering efficiency and their energy-saving drive, control and regulating systems. The agreement with Royal HaskoningDHV also includes intensive cooperation in the field of research and development, in order to ensure that the Nereda® process – which is already successfully employed in all continents – will continue to be optimized in order to meet the requirements of the customer. The initial result of this intensive cooperation: a 10-15 percent improvement in the dewatering capability of excess sludge - and thus a significant saving in terms of costs for every wastewater treatment plant.
Cooperation partnership between Cambi and GEA with tremendous prospects
A highly efficient technology for cost-saving wastewater treatment world-wide continues to achieve success in the form of the thermal hydrolysis process (THP) of Cambi using GEA decanters. The key element of the THP system developed by the Norwegian company Cambi: The considerable improvement in anaerobic digestion of sewage sludge using optimized thermal hydrolysis – with an increased digestion speed and a reduction of the amount of time spent in the digester. The extremely precise machine performances of GEA decanters are absolutely essential in the treatment of sewage sludge: The advantages include an automatically controlled constant discharge of 16.5 percent dry matter (DM) in pre-dewatering as well as a maximum dry matter of 30 to 35 percent in the final dewatering of the digested sludge. The result: With the same digester capacity, THP provides the possibility of achieving an up to 40 percent increase in the volume of sewage sludge to be processed. This avoids expensive investment costs for additional digesters and the reduced volume of digested sludge enables savings to be achieved in terms of disposal costs. The annual savings per installation can in total run into seven figures.
By the end of 2017, the THP system will be installed in a total of 54 wastewater treatment plants in approximately 20 countries, including more than 30 major installations with a population equivalent of more than 500,000 PE. GEA has the greatest amount of experience with the THP process for sewage sludge treatment in the entire sector, and in this particular field works continuously with Cambi in order to optimize processes and achieve further innovations. In consequence, the successful cooperation partnership between Cambi and GEA also offers further tremendous prospects in the huge market for wastewater treatment.
Main supplier and “preferred supplier” of Nijhuis Industries
The Dutch Nijhuis Industries specializes in the planning, production and turn-key delivery of industrial wastewater treatment plants, recycling and liquid-manure projects as well as “waste-to-value” projects. For this company with global operations, GEA has for the past approximately 20 years been one of the main suppliers of decanter equipment which for instance is used in biological wastewater treatment processes which result in savings in terms of disposal costs and which are also used in the processing of flotation sludges. For the past four years, GEA has also been the “preferred supplier” for the “GENIAAL system” of Nijhuis Industries. This highly-efficient process for treating liquid manure and fermentation residues is an intelligent combination of the application know-how of Nijhuis Industries and reliable GEA technologies which have demonstrated their value in many wastewater treatment applications. The GEA decanters ensure maximum separation of solid particles from the liquid manure in the initial pre-treatment stages, thus achieving the required separation into solid and liquid phases before subsequent flotation (DAF), ultra-filtration and reverse osmosis. The result: Using the liquid manure which would otherwise incur significant disposal costs, the user obtains reusable water (approx. 65 percent), a polymer-free solids cake which is rich in phosphates (approx. 15 percent) as well as high-quality liquid fertilizer (approx. 20 per cent) which is rich in potassium and nitrogen. An efficient win-win situation for the user and the environment which reduces costs and ensures the efficient use of resources.
Certified partnership with CDEnviro
The core competences of the international market leader CDEnviro which is based in Northern Ireland include wet processing installations for a wide range of industrial sectors and areas: e.g. road and sewer cleaning, construction and demolition companies and the treatment of agricultural harvest products such as potatoes. As a certified CDEnviro partner, GEA supplies the decanter technology for the clarification and dewatering of the sand and clay sludges in the wash water and rinsing water. Customized waterMasters of the ecoforce series ensure reliable processing of the fluctuating compositions of the material flows in the final stage of the processing system. Or stated simply: The GEA decanters reliably separate the dewatered solids and return 99 percent of the wash water and rinsing water as “clean” water to be reused in the installation. This is a key element in ensuring that CDEnviro has so far sold, installed and commissioned the highest number of wet processing installations in the world.
On target for success with energy- and resource-efficient GEA decanter technology
“In addition to our competence as an innovation and technology leader with a global sales and service network, there is a further good reason behind the extremely successful partnerships of GEA: Our partner companies appreciate the project management of GEA – as a guarantee for professionalism, customer loyalty and ability to meet deadlines and process optimization”, says Joost Vliegen. Excellent references for generating further partnerships and cooperations in the GreenTech sector at the IFAT 2016 in Munich and for ensuring that these continue to achieve success with the use of energy- and resource-efficient GEA technologies “made in Germany”.
The GEA decanter solutions which are customized for each individual customer always comply with the maximum industry standards and guarantee compliance with all prevailing standards and laws, without any concessions being made with regard to the performance of the installations.