Treatment Options
How it Works
The Two Types of WaterPlantir Processes: Continuous Flow & Sequencing Batch Reactor
In the continuous flow version, your effluent flows into a chamber inside the WaterPlantir where heavy solids settle and fatty greases float to the top. In-between this separation is where the water flows into an anoxic chamber for nitrogen removal. Nitrogen removal is important to preserve the ecosystem within the WaterPlantir for water treatment. Inside this anoxic chamber, microbes convert the nitrate into nitrogen gas (odourless!) and oxygen which they consume. However, these microbes are lazy, and if they have excess oxygen.. they don’t want to do the extra work of consuming nitrate! In order to “incentivize them” the system constantly monitors the dissolved oxygen levels and adjusts the flow to give them just enough to live, not too much to stop working, and not too little to kill them. From the anoxic chamber, the water flows into an aerobic chamber where there is plenty of oxygen provided by a nano bubbler. Here, a microbial poop party is happening! These microbes are having a fine time gobbling up all the edible food and free carbon that you provided them with, however like a bunch of overzealous engorged party people, they create waste. That waste is the aforementioned toxic nitrate. This nitrate flows back to the first chamber where it is mixed with incoming newer undigested material. This also contains lots of available carbon where it is resettled and the cycle begins - into the anoxic chamber, to the aerobic chamber and around again. This happens five to ten times until there is nothing left for the microbes to eat. At this point, the water and the undigested solids flow into a holding tank where the solids accumulate over time requiring a clean out approximately every 3 years - depending on what you are eating, how many people, etc... The water spends an additional day or two inside a holding tank where the little food that is left goes through anaerobic digestion (where there is no oxygen) and is discharged from the system. The sequencing batch reactor uses just two tanks and uses batch processing where it does the same thing but without receiving new effluent. You can think of the difference like if you clean your dishes by hand in your sink, that is “continuous flow”. If you use a dishwasher that is a “batch process.”
Water Treatment vs. Filtration
A filter is a mechanical process that uses a membrane to separate the water from the waste part. Filters can be very effective, but they have one huge issue.. they require tons of maintenance! Yes, it is true that common filtration like an ultrafiltration (lifestraw), or reverse osmosis (available at any hardware store), is great at filtering water, but they clog with sediment and biological contamination will start to grow on the filter. If you used one of these on your wastewater, it would clog in a day. Little microbes on the other hand, are quite resilient and useful for turning your wastewater into clean water. They are not technically “filtering the water", they are treating it by changing it's chemical properties.
The Waterplantir is, essentially, a little microbial greenhouse - where the water and fertilizer is your poop and wastewater. Just as it is hard to keep your houseplants alive, it is also as hard to keep this little colony alive. To manage this, the WaterPlantir has a smart electronic system connected to the internet to do this for you. We are the only company offering such intensive monitoring and automation.
Capabilities
The WaterPlantir can be configured differently for multiple use cases. Some examples include recycling the water back into the house, irrigation or discharge, or basic denitrification. For each set up, the water is treated by the microbial colony fed from by wastewater coming into the system. This colony grows in the water, on present solids, and also on specially designed corrugated plastic media. This media, the same one that municipal water plants use, is made in the USA by specialty companies. In addition to this media, there are different types of pumps to remove sludge and add oxygen to feed the colony. To maximize efficiency, the WaterPlantir uses different sensors to tune the treatment to ensure the colony has the right amount of oxygen and remains at the correct temperature using a heater. All of this sits inside your beautiful “planter box”, a design that focuses on performance and minimal maintenance with ample monitoring.
WaterPlantir vs. Municipal Treatment
Waterplantir uses the newest and best technology for municipal wastewater treatment plants, but at a micro-scale and with some differences. When comparing the treatment process, WaterPlantir significantly outperforms many municipal wastewater plants because they’re outdated by over 20 years, and too expensive for cities to upgrade. These systems operate using continuous flow - meaning they can’t hold onto water very long. When it rains, water from municipal systems dispose of untreated water because the design constrains the amount of water they’re able to treat. WaterPlantir operates at, and is held to a much higher standard than municipal water plants that are always overwhelmed and failing. WaterPlantir’s system has the advantage of being able to process the effluent until it's ready to be released because the design allows for more time than they do to process, greater processing applied per volume of water, and no effect of rainfall on the system. Additionally, WaterPlantir can custom tailor the speed of the processing to match your real world usage because it is adaptive through AI and machine learning. The system is monitored in real time and logs data into the cloud, a technology that some municipal plants have.. but not as many as you would think! Municipal and industrial systems are all designed to be monitored by a certified trained professional, to clean and maintain the system for performance. Waterplantir is designed to be run and operated by anyone with minimal cleaning and maintenance.
Regulatory Compliance
Every county in the United States requires individual certification for every septic installation. Despite using the same products and technology as their municipal system, county officials treat the WaterPlantir as any other septic certification process.