The Treaschwig Wastewater Treatment Facility serving 3500 households in four Houston, Texas neighborhoods is home to the self-sufficient Headworks® Bar Screen with 4 mm (3/16 inch) openings. The stainless steel influent Black Box™ screening system captures, removes and discharges the screenings into a Transpactor™ shaftless spiral conveyor/compactor.
Originally equipped with a coarse manual bar rack, many floatable solids passed through to the effluent discharge into Cypress Creek where children from the neighborhoods often play. These floatable solids not only caused high maintenance problems for the operators by requiring manual daily cleaning, but also caused problems with pumps by collecting on mixing blades and aeration lances then accumulating along the weirs of the clarifiers. An entirely enclosed system was vital to solving a serious odor problem wafting over the nearby residences.
The engineers’ initial thought was to specify a rotating fine screen, “but the cost was prohibitive” stated Ken Hudson, President of the Treaschwig Joint Powers Board. “We would have had to build a structure at least six feet higher than what was there and then go back to all seven of the contributing pump stations to modify the existing pumps.” The end result would have been to build a containment area as well, causing even more headaches in the end.
The Headworks® Bar Screen now installed at the Treaschwig WTF is rigid, assertive and runs completely by itself with no attendant on site. The Transpactor™ is fitted with a Pulse Wash Zone and Continuous Bagging Unit, which provides efficient screenings washing, removing organics from the screenings and returning them to the process flow for treatment. The Continuous Bagging System collects the screenings for a cleaner method of collection and disposal. This, in conjunction with the elimination of brushes and spray water, has completely wiped out all odor problems according to Mr. Hudson. All of these resourceful provisions provide trouble-free solutions and continue to demonstrate that with Headworks® , there are no headaches!
