Wastewater treatment, in most industries, is the single most important piece in maintaining environmental sustainability and conformity to regulations. Proper and effective wastewater management not only allows industrial companies to be in compliance with environmental standards but also prevents the loss of efficiency in operations and minimizes the cost of operations. Among all methods used in treating wastewater, oil skimming remains a very effective technique to remove oils, fats, and greases from water containing them, commonly known as “hydrocarbons.”. This article points out the precincts of ample business oil skimming benefits over other wastewater treatment systems.
What exactly is oil skimming?
Skimming of oil is a mechanical method that utilizes skimmers to remove floating oil and grease on the surfaces of wastewater. This mechanical process works on the differences in the specific gravities of oil and water by which it usually collects oil and lets water go. Oil skimming techniques are efficient in removing the oils that float naturally in water or rise to the surface of water, like machine oils, hydraulic fluids, and food processing fats.
Business Benefits
Companies around the world are focusing on operational efficiency and using innovative technologies to reduce operational costs and comply with environmental regulations regarding wastewater treatment.
- Cost Savings By Reducing Cost of Disposal: One telling advantage of oil skimming is a substantiated reduction in disposal costs. Removing oils from the wastewater virtually at the outset of the treatment process results in a considerable decrease in contaminated water, ultimately reducing the volumes to be disposed of. This reduces the cost of disposal by minimizing the volume of constituents for chemical use in treatment and ridding the wastewater of a much more significant percentage that would be sent off-site for disposal.
- Enhanced Environmental Compliance: Oil skimming thus plays a huge role in ensuring that industries meet the much-required environmental regulations. Legal actions as a result of environmental pollution, from discharging oil-contaminated wastewater into natural water bodies, can be very disastrous.
- Improved Operations Efficiency and Maintenance: The integration of oil skimming into a wastewater system enhances overall operational efficiency. The removed oil does not foul downstream treatment equipment like filters, pumps, and membranes, as oil separation occurs quite ahead in the process.
Case Studies and Examples
- Success Stories in Various Industries: Some of the large oil skimming implementations with huge operational advantages are in the manufacturing, automobile, metalworking, and food areas. For example, automotive plants accept oil skimmers for skinning off coolant oils and lubricants from wastewater used in manufacturing vehicles.
- Real-world Savings and Environmental Impact: Based on case studies, oil skimming is effective in generating large cost savings, too. For example, an oil skimming setup that worked efficiently saved a metalworking shop 30% annually in its waste-disposal cost. On the other hand, another food processing plant significantly decreased the contamination level of discharged water in the form of oil by 50%, making it more friendly to the environment and availing itself of punitive measures by the regulating body.
Key Considerations
- Factors Determining the Effectiveness of Skimming Oil: The effectiveness of an oil skimming system will rely on some factors: the temperature of the wastewater, the viscosity of the oils, flow rates, and the skimmer design. Proper choice of type and size of the skimmer for specific applications and conditions is important to allow maximum oil recovery and outweigh the total application cost.
- Interfacing with Existing Wastewater Systems: The use of oil skimming will have to be integrated with the existing water treatment systems through proper planning and engineering. Issues crucial to compatibility with the existing infrastructure, maintenance requirements, and scalability should go a long way toward making integration possible and improving performance over the years.
Wrapping Up
For any entity that needs super-efficient oil skimming solutions and an integrated wastewater management system, OIL WATER SEPARATOR TECHNOLOGIES (owstech.com) will be the ideal partner.
They specialize in the manufacturing of oil water separators, stop valves, containment sumps, oil skimmers, coalescing media, and other related accessories of high quality, and they have over 75 years of experience in the wastewater application market.
