Metal Finishing Wastewater Treatment
How industrial pretreatment works for metal finishing wastewater: segregated streams, chemical treatment, settling and control.
Who it is for
Operators and supervisors at industrial plants that treat metal finishing wastewater, and operators who receive it.
Format
Online, self-paced: 12 timed modules with the manual reading, worked examples and a short check after each module, plus the student manual to download.
Length and price
4 hours, $120.
What you will learn
Taught by Brad Musick. 12 modules. Examples are for training only.
- Purpose of treatment (10 min)Why a pretreatment permit is issued: to protect the treatment plant, the plant's permit, its sludge and the public.
- Sources and segregated waste streams (20 min)Electroplating and anodizing, and keeping chrome, cyanide, oily, precious metal and complexed metal streams apart.
- Reduction of hexavalent chromium (25 min)Reducing agents, low pH, reaction time, the reaction and the ORP goal.
- Cyanide destruction (25 min)Amenable and refractory cyanides, the two-step process, pH and ORP at each step, and the safety note on acidic conditions.
- Hydroxide precipitation (20 min)pH adjustment by metal, common chemicals, and the limits set by complexing ions and resolubilizing.
- Treating more than one metal (25 min)Why one pH fails, and a sensible order of treatment: separate what you can, equalize and mix, take heavy oil and solids first, destroy cyanide at high pH before acidifying for chrome, reduce hexavalent chromium at low pH, then precipitate the remaining metals near the tightest common pH window. Also chelants and complexed metals, amphoteric metals that redissolve (such as zinc), and troubleshooting a yellow effluent.
- Settling: coagulation, flocculation and polymers (20 min)The terms, polymer types and what affects polymer performance, lamella settlers, and what impacts settling.
- Oil, filters, polishing and sludge (20 min)Free oil and emulsions (separators and DAF), polishing filters, sulfide or DTC polish when nickel, cadmium or mercury leak (and its sulfide hazard), and dewatering sludge with hazardous waste (TCLP) testing.
- Jar testing and neutralization (15 min)Optimizing dose against a blank, and neutralizing high pH and low pH waters.
- pH and ORP control (20 min)pH probes and controllers, ORP as a control tool, and what to check when ORP is out of range.
- Sampling, flow measurement and maintenance (15 min)Representative grab and composite samples and preservation, weirs and ultrasonic flow measurement, and preventive maintenance records.
- Safety and wastewater math (15 min)Chemical safety and alarms, and area, volume, detention time, loading and efficiency.
See how it works
What operators take away
- A clear picture of the treatment steps for chromium, cyanide and other metals.
- How pH and ORP control work together, and what to check when one is out of range.
- A sensible order of treatment when several metals share one wastestream.
- Settling and polymer basics, and how jar tests are used.
- Sampling, flow measurement and maintenance habits.
- Timed online modules with a short check after each one, a final quiz that opens when every check is passed and the study time is logged, and a certificate of completion from Wastewater Academy™ when you pass it.
- A student manual to download (comes with the class).
Register
4 hours, $120.
CEU approval for this class is pending with Indiana IDEM, and CEUs are not approved yet. If you need CEU credit, please wait to buy until we announce approval here.
Registration is open. Register online and start right away.
After you pay, you are taken to a page where you start the online course and download the student manual. Work through the 12 modules in order; each ends with a 4-question check, and you need 3 of 4 to open the next module. The study timer counts time only while a module page is open and in front, and you have been active in the last 5 minutes. The final quiz opens after every check is passed and 3 hours 50 minutes of study are logged. It has 20 questions; you need 80 percent, with up to 3 attempts. After you pass and fill in a short course evaluation, you get a certificate of completion from Wastewater Academy™ in the name you enroll with. Online access, including the course, manual, quiz, and certificate, lasts 90 days from purchase. To see the style of questions first, try a free practice quiz.
Before you buy, read our refund policy, terms of use and privacy notice.