Pretreatment of a Food Processing Waste
RICHARD F. DUNBAR, General Manager
Chemung County Sewer District 1
Elmira, New York
CHARLES R. VELZY, President
GLENN W. WICKLUND, Project Engineer
Charles R. Velzy Associates
White Plains, New York
INTRODUCTION
The problem involved in the treatment and disposal of the waste from an
industrial plant are not all engineering or technical problems. The current recognition
of the urgent need for reduction and elimination of pollution has brought to light
practices in industrial waste disposal which must be corrected. It often comes as a
shock to the local industry to learn that its waste, which in the past has been dumped
into a local water course and forgotten, must now be treated. Upon proposing to
discharge the waste to the municipal system, a second and perhaps more severe shock
is to find that the municipal system cannot take the waste, and that it requires
separate treatment.
To handle waste from any industrial plant successfully may require analyses
and considerable research and development effort. The answer requires a recognition
of the situation and the cooperative efforts of all concerned. A major effort on the
part of the industry may be required, cooperation on the part of municipal officers
and governmental agencies is essential, and understanding on the part of the public of
the community is desirable.
It must not be assumed from the title of this paper that the waste from any
and all food processing plants would be the same or would be amenable to the
processes developed on this project. For example, the waste from a candy factory
differs materially from the waste from a packing house, and the processes for
treatment certainly would not be the same.
HISTORY OF PROBLEM
This paper deals with the acceptance and treatment of a large volume of food
processing waste in a municipal treatment plant, and some of the problems
encountered. A brief statement of the history of events will help to understand the
problem.
Chemung County, New York, is in the Finger Lakes area, 80 miles south of
Lake Ontario, 115 miles southeast of Buffalo, New York, and just north of the
Pennsylvania state line. The area is part of the Susquehanna River drainage basin
which discharges south into Chesapeake Bay.
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