Welcome, HeadsUp Readers!
It’s February – which means that many of those January 1st resolutions have already been forgotten. Perhaps you resolved to add more healthy foods into your diet? Increase your exercise? Practice mindfulness? Or simply to exercise your mind by delving into the strange myths that abound? Well, we are here to help.
With the holidays behind us, you’ve probably recovered from big group meals with family and friends. But think about providing healthy, three-course vegetarian meals twice daily to 3,000 people who show up at your door every day. Oh – make that 15,000 people on the weekends. And those special holidays? That would be 30,000 guests a day! That is what the Sri Kshetra Horanadu Annapporneshwari Temple (and that’s a mouthful!) faces as it fulfills its tribute to Annappornesh, the goddess of food and nourishment.
In keeping with the Temple Trust’s desire to be environmentally focused given their location in the Western Ghats, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the decision was taken five years ago to hire Headworks Bio to design and provide a system which can turn the wildly varying wastewater generated there into reusable water. This month’s Case Study explains the history of the Temple and how HW Bio’s system treats these dramatically fluctuating flows. Today, Mr. Girija Shankar Joshy, Managing Trustee, happily explains “When we wanted to establish the [wastewater treatment plant], we wanted the best. Hence, we chose Headworks’ MBBR. The plant has been performing very well and we have not had to replace the media or do any maintenance. After having seen other plants, we are proud to say that this is the best system in the whole district!” And we at HW Bio are proud to be a part of this holy site.
Was exercise one of your resolutions for 2019? I personally find it difficult sometimes to work in the time for that one, but this interesting article on exercise from The Guardian explains how we can benefit from anywhere from a few seconds or minutes a day of exercise. Have 5 or 10 minutes to spare for fitness? They have a suggestion for you. So, get back to that resolution in a small way at least and see where it leads you.
Small investments in your mind can have exponential benefits to how you react to life’s events. Need a few starter tips on enhancing your mindfulness? Check out this Harvard Business Review article for five simple fast tips such as turning off notifications on your smart phone for a week to see how less distracted you are. Through repeated mindfulness practice, brain activity is redirected from reactionary parts of the brain, to the rational part of the brain. As the title of the article states, spending 10 minutes a day on mindfulness changes the way you react to everything. And that’s a good thing!
Delving into the mysteries of the universe keeps my mind exercised. Last year, driving to work one day, I heard a story on the news about a convention that was happening in Denver, Colorado. The coverage was on the Flat Earthers 2018 International Convention. A convention for people who believe that the world is, well, flat. Really. It’s true. Honest. You can’t make this stuff up. The Daily Beast covered the convention and it’s worth the read.
I’ve become obsessed with this fact. Not that the world is flat, but the fact that there are people out there who honestly believe this to be true. This led me to think about the poverty of an educational system which could result in such ignorance. Or were they out smoking weed during science and history class? They missed the section on Columbus sailing to the Americas? What boggles my mind as well is that they can’t believe that the world is round, but can believe in the internet and Wi-Fi and cell phones, which sometimes confounds me.
Flat earthers use the internet to spread this and other conspiracy theories, like man never went into space, and their official organization has a nice little website with all of the information on why the earth is flat catalogued helpfully in one place. The site even has a store so you can buy your “flat earth” paraphernalia. And I’m very tempted, I must confess, by the reusable grocery bag. What a conversation starter, right? Maybe I’ll start a charity: a ticket for a flight around the world to bring the wisdom of the globe to unfortunate flat earthers.
Which reminds me how travel broadens us in so many ways, starting, I guess, with understanding the world is round. And that in a remote part of the world there is a temple to the goddess of food, and her surroundings are watered by the science of Headworks Bio.
Wishing all your resolutions come true!
Michele LaNoue
Headworks International Inc.
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Learn about the Temple and why they chose Headworks Bio here.
Headworks Bio’s MBBR Installation Celebrates 5-Year Anniversary at Sri Kshetra Horanadu Annapoorneshwari Temple to the Goddess of Food
Background
The Sri Kshetra Horanadu Annapporneshwari Temple is situated on the banks of river Bhadra in a remote corner of Karnataka, surrounded by the natural vegetation, forest, green and natural beauty of the Western Ghats. The Western Ghats are one of the eight most biologically diverse areas in the world and have been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The temple to the great deity Annapurna, the Goddess of food and nourishment, was begun 400 years ago. Initially, the temple was a small structure surrounded by nature. Even then, at least one or more people visited the remote temple, had pooja and were provided with free food (known as annaprasadam) and shelter, a tradition which has continued to date. The main deity, Annapoorneshwari, is made of gold. It is believed that a person who seeks the goddess’ blessings would never have any scarcity for food in life.
Every visitor to the Annapoorna temple at Horanadu, irrespective of their religion, language, caste, or creed, is provided with a three-course vegetarian meal (including a dessert made from Bele or Lentils). This temple sees more than 3000 visitors every day and on weekends it swells to 15,000 and on festivals and very special occasions, the number swells to 30,000.
Although the Temple Trust was not under any government compulsion, they volunteered to treat the wastewater generated at the site and reuse it for flushing toilets, horticulture and irrigation. For this holy site, Headworks Bio Inc. was selected to design a wastewater treatment process which would allow the Temple Trust to reuse the water in keeping with their dedication to the environment.
Wastewater Treatment Process
Headworks Bio proposed a wastewater treatment process utilizing Moving Bed Bio Reactor (“MBBR”) technology for a plant with an expected maximum treatment capacity of 1.0 Million Liters per Day. The Headworks MBBR solution was the ideal choice for the Temple Trust with its easy to operate, compact system with minimal environmental impact. As the wastewater generated from the visitors varied greatly during the week and weekend, the MBBR design handles these wide variations in flow and load without the performance being impacted as would happen in many other types of treatment such as conventional.
This system allows the Temple Trust to have access to reuse water 24 hours a day without having to worry about operating and controlling the treatment process. The influent to be treated has a BOD < 250 mg/l and < COD 500 mg/l. The required effluent limit was BOD < 10 mg/l and COD < 100mg/l, a significant reduction in the pollutants.
After 5 years of operation, Mr Girija Shankar Joshy, Managing Trustee, happily explains “When we wanted to establish the [wastewater treatment plant], we wanted the best. Hence, we chose Headworks’ MBBR. The plant has been performing very well and we have not had to replace the media or do any maintenance. After having seen other plants, we are proud to say that this is the best system in the whole district!”
The protected higher surface area bacterial biofilm nature of MBBR technology allows the bacteria to self-regulate, adjusting naturally to varied influent loads without compromising plant performance. Headworks Bio’s proprietary Active Cell 920 media formed the core component of the MBBR process for this installation.
As it provides an extremely high protected surface area of 680 m2/m3 for growth of the biofilm, but not so fine that the media becomes clogged and no longer functions.
If your municipality, resort, industry or temple is generating wastewater that is tough to treat, has high pollutant and/or solid loads and is a headache you want to just go away, Headworks Bio has the team that can bring you the 4 E’s: effective, efficient, economical, and easy to use solutions. With over 20 years of experience in every type of industry and municipality, our talented process engineers will fix your wastewater problems so that you can focus on your business. Contact your local manufacturers’ representative or our process engineers at sales@headworksintl.com or +1.713.647.6667 to discuss how we can get you out of the wastewater business and back to your core industry.
Keeping your fitness resolution is easier when it only takes a few seconds. Learn how here.
Here are some tips to improve your mindfulness and the rational part of your brain. Gain clarity here.
Hard to believe, but they are real. Learn about them here.
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