Organic Sludge Treatment in a Coffee Factory, South America

This case involves a coffee factory in South America that processes coffee beans. The factory production process produces a large amount of organic sludge which is normally placed in the lagoon for long-term precipitation to separate the solid and liquid.

The efficiency of the current treatment method is low resulting in more sludges accumulation and filling up the lagoon quickly. In addition, they have limited space to expand and broaden the storage lagoon area. Thus, it was imperative to find a better solution to reduce the volume of sludge.

The solution offered was to rebuild the storage lagoon into a series drying bed platform base on the available space and then decrease the volume of sludge by introducing ACETube^® dewatering system to separate solid-liquid waste. The tube for this case was fabricated with ACETex^® PP 70/105 (circumference: 12.9 m* Length:30 m). The textile has high permeability with optimal apertures as well as resistance to ultraviolet light, acid, and alkaline. Pump sludge into the ACETube^® dewatering system and add flocculants into the sludge to separate solids and water. Solids are foamed inside of the tube and clean water is drained out from the tube. After the tube is full it becomes easier to disposal.

ACETube^® dewaters the sludge with flocculants to decrease the sludge efficiently and shorten the separation time of solid and sludge significantly. Our customer is satisfied with the solution and solves the challenge of limited space available.