Heavy Metal Removal

Nalco understands that reduction in the concentration of heavy metals is an important part of the wastewater treatment process at your industrial plants. Many countries place limits on the concentration of various metals that may be discharged either directly to the environment or to a local treatment works. Further, the regulatory direction taken in the last five years has been much more restrictive in what metals and concentrations are permissible for water discharge into the environment.Metals can find their way into wastewater generated as a result of various industrial processes including the following:

• Metal working operations
• Spent baths from plating and etching operations
• Rinse water from plating baths
• Casting operations
• Air scrubbers
• Ore process waters
• Dissolution of metal-containing catalysts
• Oil & gas extraction (produced water)
• Incidental corrosion, such as cooling tower blowdown