Wastewater – Pretreatment and Primary Treatment
Wastewater treatment is the process of removing contaminants from polluted water. Polluted water can come from municipal, agricultural or industrial processes.This module describes the pretreatment and primary treatment stages of wastewater treatment, and how those stages affect one of the most common pollutants, high concentrations of organic waste.
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Course Details
Learning Objectives
• Describe the purpose of wastewater treatment
• Describe the effects of high concentrations of organic contaminants in wastewater
• Describe the purpose of wastewater primary clarification
• List three mechanical processes used for pretreatment of wastewater
• Identify and describe the main components and process flows of a primary clarifier
• List the four functional zones of a primary clarifier
Specs
Frequently Asked Questions
What are some common pretreatment processes applied to municipal effluent?
What is the primary physical process occuring in a primary clarifier?
What are the effects of discharging water with high levels of organic materials into a natural river or stream?
What happens to the sludge collected in primary clarifiers.?
Where does treated water typically exit a clarifier?
Sample Video Transcript
Primary treatment clarifiers are large settling basins, which can be circular or rectangular. Circular basins are the most common. Regardless of the shape, clarifiers have four functional zones. One, the inlet zone provides a smooth transition of the incoming stream to the clarifier. The influent is slow to prevent turbulence and distributed evenly to the settling zone. In a circular clarifier, the feed enters vertically through a central feed pipe, expands out into a feed well and then flows radially into the body of the clarifier. The goal of this layout is to provide an even flow of water, which does not interfere with the settling process. Two, the settling zone is the main volume of the clarifier, where the water velocity is low and solids are given time to settle to the bottom.
