FREMA
Water recycling.
Extra equipment.
Overview of tank farm.
Let’s discuss this.
I will make a list. We need at least one extra processing tank, and for good measure we can also use two smaller tanks for pre-processing. So here we go:
- A 5000 ltr processing tank. This tank does the job of cleaning up the water, by blowing air into it plus also gaseous ozone.
- A 1000 ltr settlement tank. This tank will be steady and allows any solid matter to sink to the bottom. The outlet to the processing tank is about 30 to 60cm from the bottom and a pump will bring water from this tank via a small glass bead filter into the processing tank.
- A 1000 Ltr receiving tank. This will receive water from the shower and the washing machine. So it will have quite a lot of soap or detergent. I blow air into this tank in order to start breaking down the detergents. For good measure I also add a small chlorine tablet every 14 days. That will control any smell and attack any bacteria. This tank will have a valve controlled overflow connection to the settlement tank.
- On top of the processing tank I have a Davey Spa blower, that operates on a timer. The air goes into the processing tank, the grey water receiving tank, the discharge from the sink tank and the filtered fresh water tank. It may seem like a luxury, but the blower delivers far more air than I need for 1 or two tanks. I tried slowing it down, but it also reduces the pressure and the bubbling stops all together.
- The ozone generator has an ozone cell and its own compressor. So I just bubble the ozone direct into the grey processing tank. Both the air blower and the ozone generator run for 15 minutes every 3 or 4 hours. You can small the Ozone via the tanks manhole. Ozone will dissolve into the water, but it will start to work immediately, but it also decomposes. There will be very little left after 1 hour, but the process is intense for the 30 minutes after ozone bubbling starts. Hence I repeat this cycle regularly. The tank is mixed when we introduce the ozone.
Originally I used liquid chlorine with a small dosing pump. But the pumps and speed control was breaking down regularly. So I changed to one tablet per tank every fortnight.
Procedure & quality.
Ozone dosing frequency.
The MP-8000 can deliver 8gram or 8000mg per hour of ozone if it is fed by pure oxygen from a cylinder. But when using air that delivery drops to 1600 mg/hr. The recommended dose for a small water tank is 1600 to 4000 mg per day, depending on the size. The target concentration of ozone is 0.4mg/Ltr, but when. That figure is meaningless, because the ozone half life concentration is 20 minutes. Which means in 1 hour the concentration is down to 12.5% of the original concentration. But the ozone oxidization activity is very strong for the first 15 minutes. However during that processing and decay process the ozone is converted to oxygen, which also does a purification task. In my system the tank volume is constant for days on end. No water in or out. So the destruction process of bacteria is cumulative. If we repeat the injection of ozone every three hours, that will be 8 times per day or 56 times in a week. I dare say that not many bacteria will survive that battering. If a bacterium was not killed during the first surge, there will be a repeat chance every 3 hours. Eventually they will all be caught.
Anyway I won’t hang my hat on that only. I can take a water sample and do a bacteria culture. If it is clear, I am happy. I have done that many times now and I have never picked up any bacteria. Yet when I test urine or faeces at the same time there are plenty of bacteria.
If you have plenty of fresh water, and all the tanks are above say 75%, then there is no deed to recycle. That will save power. So I turn the power off to either the whole lower tank farm, or just the blower and the ozone generator.
Move to water page 1, water usage
Move to water page 2, water collection
