Dealing with process wastewater can be a major headache. Make a mistake and the penalties, both financially and reputation, can be significant. Below, we take a look at the potential risks as well as an alternative solution to wastewater that addresses these risks.
Common risks associated with wastewater treatment
In an industrial facility, such as a tank terminal farm, there are dozens (if not hundreds) of considerations and decisions to make on a daily basis. Wastewater treatment may not be at the forefront of your concerns. However, there may be a few areas you haven’t considered that have the potential to damage your bottom line and your reputation.
Business Continuity
If your wastewater is causing issues with the local utility, your business is at risk, as they could reduce or revoke discharge permits. If production is halted or limited by wastewater issues, this could mean a big financial loss for the company. Even if the utility doesn’t limit current production output, they may prevent you from expanding capacity by refusing to increase permit levels. Another business risk is that even if the wastewater that you generate is not creating problems downstream, utilities are increasingly looking to upgrade aging infrastructure or accommodate growth in the community. This lack of capacity could lead to business continuity risks as well.
Non-compliance
The risk of failing to comply with local and federal regulations and laws by going over your permit discharge includes hefty fines, bad PR, and production shutdowns or slowdowns. You also may be forced to find alternative disposal options.
Spillages
Spills not only generate bad publicity, but they can carry a steep cleanup cost. However, spillage while trucking wastewater away from manufacturing plants is a possibility. These accidents, even when they are not the fault of the manufacturer or the trucking company, generate a lot of negative publicity.
Increasing wastewater cost
Sewer surcharges go up an average of seven percent annually, but can be much more depending on the location of the manufacturing facility. In addition, as energy costs go up, so do your wastewater costs. In fact, up to 30 percent of the cost of traditional wastewater removal goes towards energy costs.
Finding and keeping qualified personnel
Wastewater treatment jobs require specialized knowledge and training, which can make the process for finding the right employee difficult for manufacturing facilities that hire on-site wastewater management technicians. Since wastewater removal is necessary, but outside of the core business for most plants, the resources needed to hire, train and pay these employees are resources that are being diverted away from the primary business.
Supply disruption
This has been a particularly common issue in the COVID and post-COVID market environments. What happens if the trucking or disposal company that you depend on to manage your wastewater suddenly stops operating, reduces the number of trucks on the road, or lacks the personnel to adequately service your account?
Reputational Risk
Most of the risks outlined above eventually result in reputational risk. Spillages and non-compliance, as well as perceived impact on water scarcity can result in the community revoking the business license to operate and negative press. Even in situations where the company has not had a negative impact, the perception of your local community can massively affect your company – which is why it’s important to ensure that your wastewater treatment is not only good for business, but also for the community at large.
How to reduce risks
Processing wastewater onsite is an attractive solution for solving many of the pain points associated with wastewater. Rather than running the risks associated with trucking or discharge to the POTW, you maintain control at your facility to treat wastewater onsite.
However, traditional solutions for onsite wastewater management are costly, requiring additional personnel and space. Finding the right onsite wastewater treatment solution for your business is critical – after all, your goal is to decrease risks, not create more headaches.
Reducing wastewater risks with Aquacycl’s onsite treatment
Aquacycl understands these risks associated with wastewater treatment. That’s why our onsite wastewater treatment as a service is affordable, hands-off, and can be as small as a small shipping container, depending on the amount of wastewater you need to process. Aquacycl is a leader in developing modular technology that treats process wastewater at the source – completely reducing the risk of spillages and supply disruptions related to wastewater.
You focus on your business, let us handle the wastewater.
From an operational point of view, we guarantee permit compliance for wastewater discharge at 20-60% lower cost than alternatives, and our solutions are hands-off for the customer. This makes it possible for companies to reduce wastewater management costs without adding personnel. Our system also eliminates the risk of unpredictable costs. We provide predictable costs based on organic carbon (or biological oxygen demand – BOD) removed or flow treated.
We invite you to explore the many benefits of the Aquacycl wastewater removal system…to your business, to your customers, and to the planet. To learn more about preventing potential risks related to wastewater treatment and disposal, contact us.
