Onondaga County and WEP continue to work towards their goal of savings and sustainability with its latest project to install a new drying system at the Metro Wastewater Treatment Plant in Syracuse.
Biosolids are the organic solid materials filtered out of wastewater. The Metro Solids Management Facility was originally constructed in 1959 and serves as the solids disposal facility for Metro and 4 other WEP treatment plants. These solids are dewatered with centrifuges (like the spin cycle on your washing machine) to get rid of some moisture before the biosolids are hauled to landfills.
Each year, Metro produces about 37,000 wet tons of dewatered biosolids (aka sludge). About 70% of that weight is from water that wasn't removed from the centrifuges. That weight increases the cost of transportation and disposal.
By investing in drying technology, WEP further reduced the water weight. It's estimated that these dryers could reduct the water content to just 10%, resulting in significant savings in transportation and disposal fees.
In addition to the cost-saving benefits, the dryers increase the quality of the biosolids which allow a greater flexibility in their reusability that includes soil applications.