Rethinking Membrane Plant Operations

The City of Bozeman WTP has had membranes in service for 8 years. Over the course of the last 8 years plant operators have been working to optimize and improve operations to be more efficient and sustainable. Operators have taken initiative to optimize coagulant dosages, membrane cleaning, minimize chemical usage for residuals treatment, and reduce sludge production. These measures will prove to not only save money on chemical costs, but also delay the need for expensive capital improvement projects. In January of 2020 plant operators took the initiative to begin recycling all membrane backwash water back through the head of the plant to “pre-seed” the very clean influent water during the winter. Given that the very clean cold water is very hard to treat, this proved helpful to improve settled water quality. This also reduced sludge production and chemical use significantly.

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