In recent years, the Engineering and Environmental Services Department has clearly opted for the anaerobic treatment of industrial waste. In many cases, the intrinsic advantages of this type of treatment make it the far superior choice in both financial and technological terms, compared to other treatment methods. Firstly, this Department is convinced that it will be even more advantageous in the future.

Generally, one of the sectors in which anaerobic technology treatment plants are most appropriate is distilleries. This is due, amongst other reasons, to the highly polluting nature of the effluent and the fact that it has been shown to be biodegradable, combined with the distillation process's high energy requirements. After a long prior study, BEAM GLOBAL ESPAÑA, S.A. has chosen MP to treat the distillery residues generated by the wine distillation process in the company’s factory in Tomelloso, Ciudad Real province.

In many cases, the intrinsic advantages of anaerobic systems make them superior, both financially and technologically, compared to other treatment methods.

The factory currently has a treatment plant for the waste from the must purification process, based on aerobic treatment using an SBR reactor installed by MP in 2005.

The solution adopted to treat both types of waste requires the existing treatment plant to be extended by an anaerobic pre-treatment which is followed by treatment in the existing aerobic SBR. This combined treatment will make it possible to reduce the levels of contaminants in the effluent well below the levels set by the Tomelloso Town Hall’s regulations.

Once this extension has been completed, the treatment plant will consist of the following parts:

• Two homogenization tanks (with a total capacity of 2,000 m3 of waste)
• Waste pre-preparation system to correct temperature and pH,
• Anaerobic UAC process made up of a reactor, sludge separation equipment and safety flare torch.
• Tank for flocculation of anaerobic effluent
• Aerobic SBR treatment reactor.
• Sludge dehydration system based on sedimentation
• A system for using the biogas to run the factory’s own boilers.

The following characteristics of the proposed design should be emphasised:

• Flexibility to manage the variations in the input loads that occur throughout the year, depending on the factory's production.
• Minimal cost of running the treatment plant due to maximum levels of automation, minimum consumption of reagents and minimal rates of sludge production.
• And, of course, biogas generation is maximised and it is fully used in the existing boilers, thus reducing significantly the factory's consumption of natural gas.  In fact, based on our estimates, running the new treatment plant is expected to be profitable for the factory.

MP’s experience in turnkey environmental engineering projects, together with our technologists  know-how in the area of GWE anaerobic processes, ensure that the extension of this treatment plant will provide benefits to the client (in terms of energy), instead of constituting an environmental problem.

With this new reference, MP’s Engineering and Environmental Services Department continues to implement cutting-edge technology which is specifically appropriate to each situation. The anaerobic technology applied to the treatment of waste from wineries and distilleries is the ideal solution, just as bio-distillation is ideal for olive oil mills or the leachates from landfill sites, SBR for slaughterhouses and vegetable canning plants, and the MBR technology for golf courses and housing developments.

Manuel M. de Soto
Design Department