SIPLUS extreme for wastewater treatment
Robust, specially enhanced automation and drive components for extreme environmental conditions
Wastewater must undergo numerous complex processes before it reaches the required level of purity. When you choose Siemens for your wastewater plant automation, you’re collaborating with a partner who understands your processes and has the answers for your challenges.
Wastewater sources
Conditions for automation and visualization components in a wastewater treatment plant are particularly challenging, since the plant is host to wastewaters from numerous sources containing pollutants in varying amounts.
Municipal waste water
Municipal wastewater contains substances like pre-fermented fecal matter and food residues, disinfectants, detergents and cleaning agents.
Industrial waste water
Industrial wastewater comprises all wastewater generated during industrial production and processing activities. Its composition can vary from one day to the next. Chemical pollution is particularly high in this case.
Food industry’s waste water
Wastewater from the food industry, especially meat processing, includes substances like ammonium, blood, fecal matter, solid matter and biological residues, as well as chemicals and disinfectants.
Challenges
There is a high concentration of pollutants throughout the plant, such as hydrogen sulfide, which has a highly corrosive effect. The precise composition of the incoming wastewater is generally unknown and can vary from day to day.
Corrosive gas
Fermentation and putrefaction of the wastewater lead to the creation of harmful gases like hydrogen sulfide. As a result of many wastewater plants’ compact structure wind distributes these gases throughout the plant, which may lead to corrosion damage. The result is extensive material damage and, in the worst case, overflows from the retention basins and plant downtimes.
Temperature extremes
The control cabinets in wastewater plants are generally decentralized and distributed throughout the entire plant. This means that automation components are exposed to major temperature extremes, including frost and direct sunlight.
Corrosive dust
Sand and dust mixtures from the drying process can settle on the components.
Corrosion and wear caused by dust can lead to component failure.
Condensation
Temperature fluctuations between day and night can result in condensation on the components. Droplet formation and 100 percent relative humidity can result in failures.
