Industrial wastewater filtration, overview of the Baleen Filter

The Baleen Filter is a highly-efficient non-pressurised self-cleaning solution for separating solids from wastewater streams, and offers several compelling benefits and advantages over conventional systems that you may be using or considering.

It was designed to overcome problems with traditional systems of treating industrial and municipal wastewaters, which typically involve segregation of contaminants by less effective settling or flotation methods, which can create adverse effects like increased odours, and significant maintenance issues, such as sludge handling.

From a commercial perspective, Baleen Filter based solutions for industrial wastewater treatment typically provide a payback within 12-24 months, with much reduced costs for maintenance of wastewater treatment systems, increased water recycling/reuse and easy recovery of byproducts.

What It Does

There are generally three stages to treating wastewater, primary, secondary and tertiary, with each stage requiring some form of filtration or separation methodology. The Baleen Filter can be used at any of these stages:

1. Primary treatment - to separate visible, settleable constituents.

2. Secondary treatment - to remove fine suspended and/or soluble constituents.

3. Tertiary treatment - to produce water acceptable for a a specified purpose/subsequent use, which in many cases requires pre-filtration to less than 0.1mm (100 micron or 140 Mesh).

Any questions, just ask us.

Baleen Filter technology provides non-pressurised separation to 25 microns without chemical assistance, and to 3 microns with chemical assistance.

The Baleen Filter removes suspended organics, fines, bacterium and sands from wastewater streams, refer the chart at right for details.

There are many different industrial wastewater treatment applications for the Baleen Filter technology, click here to read some.

The Baleen Filter can be employed as a pre-filtration device for higher level filtering systems and for cleanup of backwash streams using flocculation techniques.

Baleen Filter's place in the filtration spectrum

The Baleen Filter can be seen as the "missing link" between coarse screening (above 2mm) and micro-filtration (below 20 micron), as illustrated in the diagram above. Please note, 1000 micron = 1mm or 1/25".

How It Works

The Baleen Filter uses a double act of high pressure, low volume sprays, one which dislodges material caught by the filter media, whilst the other spray sweeps the material away for collection.

This process removes even the most troublesome of constituents such as grit, suspended and fibrous matter, grease and oil from water without blocking the filter.

As water flows through the filter media, solids initially suspended in the water are left behind. But before they accumulate to block the screen media the second spray transports these contaminants away from the filtering zone, enabling the filtering process to continue without disruption.

Refer the animated demonstration below right to see how it works. For answers to common questions, visit our FAQ page.

>>>See how the Baleen Filter works

The Baleen Filter in action - Quicktime or Windows Media Player required.
View movie

What a Customer Says

"We installed the Baleen Filter unit to replace traditional aerobic biodegradation using a settling pond that we had used since we started operations. It has delivered a range of benefits including removing the odour problem we had, reduced our water storage requirements, as we now re-use much of the filtered wastewater and freed up valuable land. Importantly, we now meet environmental regulations."

Greens General Foods, Victoria, Australia

If you have a similar situation, please contact us for an appraisal.

Major Benefits for Industry

Lower capital costs, compared with traditional settling and clarifying methods.
Very versatile - can be adapted for use as a mobile clean-up system and emergency pollution response.
Small footprint - saving valuable land.
Ideal for resource recovery.
Environmentally friendly, reduced or no chemicals required.
Low operating costs, low energy needs and low maintenance.
Simplicity in industrial wastewater management.

Range of Options - Customised to Suit Individual Requirements

The scalable, modular Baleen Filter technology and supportive components are custom designed to meet individual client needs. Solutions depend on the industry, and relevant occupational health and safety or process considerations, the application and treatment objectives, and expectations, and the scale and number of units required. To learn about the range of options click here.

More information:

To read examples of applications and cases using the Baleen Filter, click here.

If you need to treat wastewater in a mining operation, read and see a video about how the Baleen Filter can assist process wastewater from mineral processing.

We have a small but growing list of answers to questions asked by customers, these may help you too.

Want to know how the Baleen Filter compares with conventional systems in use, and comparative advantages, then click on Baleen Filter advantages.