Sausage processing is a big part of the meat processing industry. Sausages are very popular foods that accompany people all over the world throughout the day. Even for breakfast, sausages or a simple loaf of bread with sliced sausage end up on the plate in some regions. The choice of sausage is huge and there are no limits to the creativity of sausage makers. But sausage processing in particular produces a lot of wastewater, the treatment of which is particularly important.
Sausage processing wastewater treatment
The characteristics of sausage processing
The processing of meat into sausage has been around for a very long time. Around 2,600 years ago, the Chinese made a sausage meat that they stuffed into cleaned casings and then cooked. Today, every country processes different amounts of meat into sausage. While the proportion is very high in Australia, Germany and the USA, southern European countries produce less sausage in comparison.
The sausage processing is always similar. At its core, sausage consists of muscle meat, bacon, salt and spices. The butcher chops and mixes all the ingredients to make sausage meat. He fills this either into a casing or into a tin. To make the sausage meat firm and to preserve the sausage, there are two methods in which water plays a major role: Scalding in a water bath or with steam.
The wastewater that is produced contains a high proportion of grease and other organic substances. In addition, wastewater is produced during the cleaning of all work surfaces, equipment and tools. It mixes with blood, fat, oil and grease, resulting in high COD and BOD. The wastewater must not flow into the environment without treatment.
The advantages of ClearFox® wastewater treatment plants
ClearFox® treatment plants are ideal solutions for wastewater treatment in sausage processing. For example, the ClearFox® DAF – Dissolved Air Flotation – removes almost all dissolved solids by binding them and discharging them via flotation. The ClearFox® FBBR – fixed bed biological reactor – consists of net tubes on which microorganisms settle that break down the dissolved substances in the wastewater. The ClearFox® SBR – Sequential Batch Reactor – supplies oxygen to the microorganisms in the wastewater at regular intervals, which convert the dissolved substances into secondary sludge that settles on the bottom of the plant.
ClearFox® treatment plants are particularly suitable for sausage processing companies because they are mobile and modular. They can be moved if necessary and expanded at any time. If the limits for discharging into a public body of water change, an uncomplicated retrofit of the existing treatment plant is possible at any time. Every customer receives a turnkey treatment plant, which the ClearFox® team tests in the main factory in Bayreuth. This keeps on-site commissioning to a minimum. The investment and operating costs of the ClearFox® treatment plants are very low, making them ideal for wastewater from sausage processing.
