Floc Sed Optimization

Floc Sed Optimization Team

Our research focuses on evaluating the current system and reducing unnecessary water waste, chemical use, and construction costs associated with the flocculator and sedimentation tank. This optimization process would essentially reduce the size of the system and ultimately reduce the cost of building and maintaining an AguaClara designed water treatment plant. Experimentation for this group will be guided by a cost analysis of these two major features and parameters such as flocculator length, recycle flow rate ratio, sedimentation upflow velocity and capture velocity will be reevaluated.
In addition, the effects of introducing a floc recycle process will be analyzed so as to determine if the reuse of developed flocs will benefit the efficiency of the system.

Current & Future Research

As a team new to AguaClara, we are currently working on analyzing the effects of incorporating floc recycle into the water treatment system. There are several variables involved in reusing flocs - such as the location from where flocs are pulled and the dosage of coagulant corresponding to the turbidity of the influent raw water - and much future work can be dedicated to finding the optimal settings for such variables. Currently however we are at the stage at which we are experimenting to determine if incorporating floc recycle will prove beneficial in any situation at all.