Pretreatment of Industrial Wastewaters

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This specialist group (SG) has a focus on appropriate and sustainable treatment systems for industrial wastes to enable safe discharge to sewerage systems or the environment. Key aspects of the pretreatment programs (technical, administrative, fiscal) include the impact of industrial discharges on municipal treatment works and transfer systems; characterization and categorization of industrial wastewaters; end of pipe treatment technologies and in-plant water efficiency control, planning, development, management and troubleshooting of industrial wastewater treatment facilities; recycling, material recovery and waste minimization; waste to energy and treatment and disposal of toxic sludge.

Industrial wastewater is typically characterized by a wide range of contaminants which if released inappropriately to the environment will impact on local and potentially regional resources (surface water groundwater and land). The vision of the group is to provide knowledge sharing to enable appropriate collection, treatment and disposal of contaminants of concern, and so enable sustainable industrial operations and management.

It is considered that a major driving force in development and take-up of pre-treatment of industrial wastes is the suitable application of energy generation from wastes (using anaerobic digestion or other process). The advent of sustainable treatment through a robust economic approach and whereby beneficial by-products can be realised (energy, residuals management and effluent re-use) is regarded as a major goal.