Safe separation of complexing agents and heavy metals: VACUDEST in use in electroplating

No electroplating company likes to deal with the subject "wastewater". But what happens if a representative of the authorities takes an unannounced wastewater sample and finds out that the nickel limit value has been significantly exceeded? A horror scenario that causes a lot of trouble, work and costs money as well.

The solution: A VACUDEST vacuum distillation system, which scores points with its maximum operational safety. Thanks to the physical evaporation process, heavy metals and complexing agents are reliably separated from the electroplating wastewater without the use of expensive chemicals. Our technology safely complies with even the strictest discharge limits. You can focus on what is really important: Your surface and electroplating technology.

Sustainable wastewater treatment: distillate of the highest quality to conserve the natural resource water

The limit values to be complied with, especially regarding to heavy metals, are becoming increasingly strict and the requirements for manufacturing companies are rising. With our VACUDEST vacuum distillation systems as the core technology, we can offer complete solutions which are specially adapted to our customer requirements.

Where traditional chemical-physical treatment processes often reach their limits, the evaporator technology of H2O offers an extremely attractive alternative. Heavy metals such as zinc, nickel or cadmium, whose limit values are often difficult to meet due to their stable complexes, are completely separated in our VACUDEST based on their boiling point differences. This ensures that even with slightly varying compositions, the discharge limits can be safely met without the need of using expensive chemicals. The potential combined treatment of alkaline and acidic rinsing water, as well as active baths which can be dosed continuously, enables a further reduction in operating costs for a necessary pH value adjustment.

When designing the respective wastewater treatment system, H2O relies on its longstanding experience and expert knowledge of application technology. These experts will design the optimum system based on wastewater analyses and they can also help to optimise customer processes. As a result, it is often no longer the discharge into the sewer system that is the focus of attention, but the reuse of the recovered water in the production process.

In accordance with the large number of possible galvanic processes, the range of different process waters is just as large. Only a small selection of applications our VACUDEST is used for is listed below.

Possible types of wastewater:

• Zn, Ni rinse water (sulphamate, Wattsch electrolyte)
• Anodising
• Silver and copper rinse water
• Chromium (VI) and cyanide detoxification
• Stainless steel pickling
• and many more

Your soution could look like this

With our complete solutions - here in the example for up to 4,500 m³ per year - you are optimally set up in your production. Our experts will design a VACUDEST system with great care, individually tailored to your needs. This also includes inter alia the storage tanks adapted to your local conditions. The collected, used rinsing water is pre-treated in an intermediate process depending on its composition. For example, the pH value can be adjusted to the optimum value for your specific application using a neutralisation device. In order to ensure that the pH value of the purified distillate is also constantly in the desired range, the distillation system is equipped with the Destcontrol module, among other things.

The cleaning of the heat exchanger using our Activepowerclean technology ensures a clean heat exchanger surface during the distillation. This lowers the energy consumption and reduces the use of resources for a dry cleaning.

The core of the system is the vacuum evaporator VACUDEST. The wastewater is treated under the most energy-efficient conditions. Depending on the concentration of corrosive salts, such as chloride compounds, the evaporator can be designed in different material stages.
In order to achieve a complete absence of wastewater in your process, we recommend our VACUDEST ZLD. The downstream evaporation stage enables you to reduce the residual water content in the evaporation residue significantly . This reduces your disposal costs and you might be able to recover important secondary raw materials.

With the final distillate control as well as the possibility of various post-treatments, e.g. ion exchangers, the perfect result is constantly guaranteed. Evaporation losses are compensated by freshwater treatment using a reverse osmosis plant with softening.

No more worries about your process water - concentrate on what really counts!

Your benefits at a glance

• Sustainable recycling of rinse water
• Elimination of complicated chemical handling
• Consulting & wastewater analysis by the H2O application centre
• Individual solution for your process
• Space-saving turnkey system
• Low operating costs thanks to maximum energy efficiency
• Low operating efforts thanks to fully automatic operation
• User-friendly Vacutouch machine control (Ready for Industry 4.0)
• Reliable compliance with internal and external limit values 

For more advantages of the VACUDEST vacuum distillation units please follow the link.