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When it comes to “the” water quality event of the year, the title would have to go to WEFTEC®. Short for the Water Environment Federation’s Annual Technical Exhibition and Conference, WEFTEC has been held annually since 1928. This year’s event, WEFTEC 2015, will be held in Chicago, Illinois at McCormick Place. It will take place from September 26 through September 30, 2015.

What can attendees expect from their time at the conference? If they are there to find out all that is new and revolutionary in the world of wastewater treatment, they won’t be disappointed. Billed as the largest conference of its kind in North America and recognized as the largest annual water quality exhibition in the world, the event brings together water quality professionals from around the globe. It then gives all those in attendance (an estimated 22,000) access to these professionals as well as to the most cutting-edge technologies in the field.

The conference’s website sums up the experience this way: “With all that WEFTEC has to offer it is the clear choice for anyone interested in learning and sharing more about the latest in water quality developments, research, regulations, solutions and cutting-edge technologies.”

Following are some of the wastewater treatment innovations attendees can anticipate:

1. Headworks – The first phase in a complicated process that occurs at wastewater treatment plants, headworks’ ultimate aim is a reduction in the incoming wastewater’s amount of pollutants to a level that, now that the wastewater has been treated, it can be discharged into a natural body of water like a stream, river or lake. Headworks allows this discharging by removing organic materials such sticks, stones, grit and sand from the wastewater. This is an important initial step in the treatment process because it safeguards downstream process equipment from the wear and tear such particles wreak on it.
2. Grit Classifiers – According to the EPA, a grit classifier picks up where the headworks leaves off. Alternatively, it can be used as phase one in wastewater treatment when finer particles like grit and sand are all that need to be initially removed. “Once removed from the [grit] chamber, grit is usually washed with a hydrocyclone or grit classifier to ease handling and remove organic material.”
3. Sludge Handling – Like headworks, sludge handling is a multi-phase procedure in the wastewater treatment process. The first step in sludge handling involves sludge thickeners that reduce the volume of sludge that must be contended with and to move the generated waste that is activated from the secondary clarifiers. Sludge digestion, both anaerobic and aerobic, rounds out the process.
4. Add Dewatering – Add dewatering occurs after sludge handling. It treats and reduces the sludge through the addition of a dewatering agent that improves the dehydration properties of the sludge.
5. Screening – Screening is used to remove non-natural material from wastewater. As the EPA describes: “Screening removes objects such as rags, paper, plastics, and metals to prevent damage and clogging of downstream equipment, piping, and appurtenances. Some modern wastewater treatment plants use both coarse screens and fine screens.”
6. Auger Screws – Wastewater treatment plants use conveyor or auger screws in many applications throughout the wastewater treatment process. 

Contact Falcon Industries to discuss your wastewater auger needs while at WEFTEC.