Hospital & Municipal Wastewater Treatment Difference

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I am a WASH ​specialist from ​Pakistan. I am ​investigating ​different ​wastewater ​treatment ​plants for our ​project ​purposes.  ​

Could someone ​elaborate on ​the ​differences ​between ​hospital and ​municipal ​wastewater ​treatment ​plants in terms ​of technology, ​deisgn, ​capacity and ​finance. ​

Hospital ​wastewater ​contains ​various ​potential ​hazardous ​pharmaceutical ​materials but ​on the other ​hand municipal ​wastewater ​contains faecal ​matter and even ​some robust ​materials that ​need to be ​phisically ​removed, so how ​do the ​treatment ​plants differ?​

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12 Answers

  1. I agree with Sameer. In hospital wastewater, I typically use hydrodynamic cavitation to break down any complex chemicals such as your pharmaceuticals, the water may have to go through several static mixers and mechanical aeration depending on the nature of contaminants. Filtration is then done using an Optimised Velocity Filter with Activated Filter Media which will filter down to 0,45 micron to remove microbiological contaminants and other dissolved organics. We have developed such a process successfully here in Australia for potable water supply to hospitals.

    We can scale this system to any capacity. The largest we have done is 30kL/h flow rate.  A system of this size would cost approximately 200,000 USD including all design, manufacturing, and commissioning of the system.

    Municipal wastewater would have a higher organic load and as such would need biological treatment. I suggest a membrane bio-reactor as an efficient and cost-effective technology to scale to any size for municipal use. I have done projects up to 100kL/day in size, a plant this size would be 874,000 USD including all design, manufacturing, and commissioning of the system.

    If you would like to know more, please email me at andrew@waterandoilsolutions.com.au

  3. Pl. contact Mr.Nisar of FTI for guidance. His cell no. is 0300-8274884.He has successfully designed and installed waste treatment Plant at Sui Gas Field for PPL.

    Regards

    M.Ilyas Khan.

     

    1 Comment

  6. Dear Md. Tariq,

    "Hospital waste" generated during the patient care. Hospital waste is a potential health hazard to the health care workers, public and flora and fauna of the area. Hospital acquired infection, transfusion transmitted diseases, rising incidence of Hepatitis B, and HIV, increasing land and water pollution lead to increasing possibility of catching many diseases. Air pollution due to emission of hazardous gases by incinerator such as Furan, Dioxin, Hydrochloric acid etc. have compelled the authorities to think seriously about hospital waste and the diseases transmitted through improper disposal of hospital waste. 

    The municipal waste indicator shows trends in the amounts of such waste generated and the amounts recovered and disposed of through:

    1. recycling & composting.

    2. incineration (including energy recovery)

    3. landfill

  7. Dear WASH specialist, Water from operation theatre and clinical labs have very high COD and BOD level also this waste which in technical terms is lebelled as liquid bio medical waste. Due to its high contaimination level it tend to add on contaiminationlevel. In A STP all conducive factors are available for bacterial growth leading to make raw sewage under treated.

    Here in India Delhi government issued a notification for seggrigating this water treating it separately and then mixing it with raw sewage for further treatment.

    I had an opertunity to treat high COD and BOD level in pharmacetical plant . Initial trial shows a reduction of 75% to 80% COD reduction through Advanced oxidation process. The only limitation with this technology is this an expansive option. If you need more information you can write to me  on rakesh@berspl.com

  8. The difference of course is ,at least in the fact that in the effluent from hospitals a lot more harmful bacteria and residues of drugs. For their destruction biological method is not suitable, because a medication to kill the microorganisms participating in the process of wastewater treatment. We have developed a method and successfully applied it to wastewater treatment of various companies, including the "difficult" waste. Difference of our method is that for wastewater treatment, we use only physical processes taking place in a CLOSED apparatus. We process : - temperature, cavitation, mechanical destruction, electrolysis, oxidation, local pressure, by magnetic treatment. The combination of these processes leads to a complete Disinfection and changes in the chemical composition of wastewater. With further filtration and precipitation of the smallest particles we get clear water with no smell suitable for irrigation. or technical needs.

    1 Comment

    1. It is nonsense to state that "biological method is [sic] not suitable". Of course they are, and are used globally for treating hospital wastewater. I suspect you are only saying that to try to sell your own technology, but by doing so you are misleading others and abusing this forum. 

  9. The wastewater you are treating from both sources are basically the same abet some subtle differences.  Yes hospital wastewater contains more pharmaceuticals but when mixed with the rest of the wastewater and faecal matter (yes folk crap in hospitals too) it is not a major problem as it will be very dilute.  The biggest difference could be the amount of rags (incontinence pads etc.) along with the cardboard urine bottles.  These should be separated from the waste stream but many just get dumped.  All these contribute to a large quantity of solids that clog up pumps etc.  In design terms the volumes attributed to the individual are different, with more water use in hospitals as opposed to residential systems. 

  10. Difference between Hospital wastewater treatment & Conventional wastewater treatment : Brief .

    Eight pharmaceuticals, two polycyclic musk fragrances and nine endocrine disrupting chemicals were analysed in several waste water treatment plants (WWTPs). A membrane bioreactor in pilot scale was operated at different solid retention times (SRTs) and the results obtained are compared to conventional activated sludge plants (CASP) operated at different SRTs. The SRT is an important design parameter and its impact on achievable treatment efficiencies was evaluated. Different behaviours were observed for the different investigated compounds. Some compounds as the antiepileptic drug carbamazepine were not removed in any of the sampled treatment facilities and effluent concentrations in the range of influent concentrations were measured. Other compounds as bisphenol-A, the analgesic ibuprofen or the lipid regulator bezafibrate were nearly completely removed (removal rates >90%). The operation of WWTPs with SRTs suitable for nitrogen removal (SRT>10 days at 10 °C) also increases the removal potential regarding selected micropollutants. No differences in treatment efficiencies were detected between the two treatment techniques. As in conventional WWTP also the removal potential of MBRs depends on the SRT. Ultrafiltration membranes do not allow any additional detention of the investigated substances due to size exclusion. However, MBRs achieve a high SRT within a compact reactor. Nonylphenolpolyehtoxylates were removed in higher extend in very low-loaded conventional WWTPs, due to variations of redox conditions, necessary for the degradation of those compounds.

  12. There is hardly any difference in the design or the cost. We provide a single system where MAST technology uses a combination of microbes and algae to treat the wastewater. While the selection of the microbes and algal species will differ for either of the applications, the other difference could be the HRT (Hydraulic Retention Time). While India has a tighter requirement in municipal sewage for BOD5 which calls for an additional treatment using Multistage Fixed Film System to treat the sewage. So the CAPEX and OPEX will go up. 

    I cannot give a comparison in terms of cost for Pakistan as I am not aware of the discharge guidelines adopted by the Pakistani Government. 

    Our MAST technology is a self sustaining system that generates profits and revenue for the customer and therefore while there would be an initial capital investment this can be recovered in 5-8 years time. The operating expenses are recovered from the revenue generated by products produced by the MAST technology wastewater system.

    In case of pharmaceutical effluent it is important to treat the endocrinal disruptors and the process of treatment will require more detailed study.