ZENON Environmental was awarded a contract to supply its membrane technology to treat wastewater for the City of Traverse City and five neighbouring townships.
Richard I. Lewis, the City Manager, stated that Council approved the move to membranes for a number of reasons. One of them is the ease with which the plant can be retrofitted to increase capacity without incurring additional major facility expansion. In addition, there is a strong concern by residents to improve the local environment, making water quality a significant factor. Treated sewage is discharged into nearby Boardman Lake, which then flows through to Lake Michigan.
The contract with ZENON is valued at approximately $10 million and according to Mr. Lewis their investment is well worthwhile. He noted that the move to using membranes will result in the cleanest water the area has had in the last 100 years.
ZENON will be converting the existing conventional activated sludge plant to a membrane bioreactor using its proprietary ZenoGem technology. The ZenoGem is ideally suited for applications where the treated wastewater is discharged to an environmentally sensitive area.
Ordinarily, raw sewage contains approximately 250-400 milligrams of suspended solids per litre. ZENON's membrane bioreactor filters this, reducing the solid content down to virtually 0 milligrams per litre. In contrast, conventional treatment, which only allows particles to settle at the bottom of the tank, reduces the solid content to approximately 20-30 milligrams per litre.
This plant will be the largest municipal membrane sewage treatment plant in North America. There are only two larger plants in the world and both are currently being installed in Europe by ZENON.
Source: Zenon Environmental
