Reusing vs. Recycling Water

There is one more contributing part to ROI. It’s less tangible, but still very real. To present your facility in the most positive light, you spend time cleaning and maintaining it, and you pay the hourly labor for it. Equipment repairs due to aggressive wear and tear, too, cost capital dollars. If the reclaim system you install does a better job of keeping the facility clean with less damage to your washing equipment, you will spend less on labor and equipment maintenance. It may be an ancillary benefit, but the savings in dollars is, nevertheless, very real.

What about the odor? Odor is caused by bacteria, which multiply at an incredible rate. When they die, which is also quickly because they have a very short life cycle, they decompose and begin to smell. If you can smell them at a wash that has a water-recycling system, you know that the system does not have an effective way to control the decomposing bacteria.

There are a number of ways to control bacteria. We have found that ozone is the most effective way to control this odor, so we use it in our systems. Not all ozone systems are created equally. There are two ways of creating it — UV light and corona discharge. Systems we have seen which utilize UV light to produce ozone don’t seem to produce enough of it to effectively kill 100 percent of bacteria. In addition, production of ozone diminishes as the bulb ages, so its effectiveness gets even worse. When considering a reclaim system that controls odor in this way, make sure you get a satisfactory answer about how it will control odor in the long run.

In our experience, the most effective way to manufacture ozone (O3) is through corona discharge. Simply put, corona discharge sends a high-energy electric charge across compressed concentrated oxygen to split the oxygen (O2) molecules. These molecules combine with other oxygen molecules to form ozone.

Not all corona discharge ozone systems are created equally, either. Many that we have seen are also insufficient to effectively treat 100 percent of the bacteria present in reclaim holding tanks. Why is that, you may ask? Heat is a byproduct of ozone generation. As the heat in the ozone generator and the equipment room in the summer increases, the amount of ozone produced decreases. The end result is a quantity of ozone that is not going to control all the odor-producing bacteria.

There is a solution, however. There are systems available that can, and do, cool the generators sufficiently — even in the summer — to maintain their output at a high enough level to contain odor and to treat other impurities in the water over the long haul. The result is water that does not smell and that can be discharged to the sewer without riling governing authorities.

As previously discussed, most carwashes discharge water to the sewer based on the stipulations in a discharge permit secured by the operator when the carwash is built. This permit lays out what you are and are not allowed to discharge to the sewer. Beware that noncompliance with this permit can be very expensive. As we said previously, more and more water departments are placing magnifying glasses on businesses such as carwashes to ensure the protection of the water supply. If your reclaim system is not properly treating your water to meet these increasingly stringent regulations, you are asking for trouble.

In the final analysis, carwashing is still the great business today that it has always been. Technological improvements to equipment have made an impact in all phases of the business, including water-recycling technology. The key to which equipment you purchase and put online lies in what you want to accomplish for your business. In our experience as operators, there was no debate. Hands down, recycled water was far more beneficial to our business than poorly filtered water. Our cars were cleaner, our washes stayed cleaner, our equipment maintenance was substantially less and, most of all, our customers were happier. After all, isn’t that the name of the game?

Robert Harvey is a chemical engineer with more than 25 years experience designing, fabricating, installing and permitting industrial water treatment and recycling systems. As director of engineering and support, Harvey developed the AquaMizer Carwash Water Recycling Systems product line for Hydro Management Systems. For more information, visit www.aquamizer.com.