Jasper — Walter “Harry” Davis, Public Works Director for the city of Jasper, took a test drive last week, but it wasn’t in a new dump truck. It was with an innovative new piece of equipment that may be spinning wastewater sludge into revenue for the city within a few years.

Davis set up the demonstration at Jasper’s Wastewater Treatment Plant the week of Feb. 28 through March 3 with the cooperation of Cory Peavy, sales engineer for Tom Evans Environmental Inc. of Lakeland, which provided the equipment.

“He was incredibly impressed with the quality of both the cake solid byproduct, as well as the clean water it returns to the plant for processing,” Peavy said.

Harry pointed out, “the byproduct literally comes out like potting soil with very little odor. It smells like tilled up soil.”

This new machine is a dewatering centrifuge manufactured by a U.S. company, Centrisys Corporation of Kenosha, Wis. The centrifuge operates like the spin cycle on a washing machine, throwing the heavier solid elements to the outside of the unit and creating cleaner water in the center.

“By clean, we mean as clean as you can see in the picture,” Peavy said.

Lab results showed that 99 percent of the solids coming into the centrifuge were captured. The byproduct comes out as a nearly odorless material with “potting soil”-like consistency that can be spread as a fertilizing agent, according to Florida statutes on land not immediately being used for agriculture.

Centrisys Corporation has built their company on the latest in centrifuge technology, including their hydraulic drive that operates the centrifuge system like the cruise control on a car. It allows the operators to continue their normal duties around the plant, while the machine runs in automatic mode, constantly adjusting itself to produce the byproduct and clean water without constant supervision.

Peavy stated that Councilman LaBarfield Bryant and City Manager Charles Williams were also impressed with the technology and results during their visit of the centrifuge demonstration.

“The real value is in the revenue this system will generate for the city of Jasper,” Peavy said. “If this technology is implemented, the city would recognize a huge economic boost despite current challenging market conditions.”

Peavy explained that currently due to the variable waste loading the city of Jasper has a fleet of tanker trucks hauling anywhere from 4-12 truckloads of 1-2% liquid wastewater to dump sites across the county per day.

“That means the city pays to acquire, maintain, insure and fuel this fleet of diesel tanker trucks,” he said. “With diesel prices close to $3.50/gallon for those 4-12 trips and the trucks getting only 5-10 miles per gallon, the cost on a 44-mile roundtrip 8 times a day, 5 days a week all year round is $41,000 in fuel savings alone.”

The result equates to an annual total cost with maintenance, insurance, etc. on hauling alone at around $100,000 per year for Jasper. This new centrifuge equipment produces byproduct over 10 times drier than what the city hauls now in a dry, easy to haul and spread form at around 23 percent according to lab results. This means the city would haul one load for every 10, cutting the number of trips from 4-12 to just one per day. That works out to an annual reduction in hauling cost of around $90,000 per year.  

After considering the initial expense to implement this new centrifuge technology of around $450,000, it would take the city five years to pay back the machine with its annual hauling savings. Every year after that the city would have the additional $90,000 as revenue to fund other projects.  

“There are other costs like electricity to consider, but because of the latest in hydraulic drive technology, the Centrisys machine only pulls close to 30 amps when operating. That’s less than a 50 horsepower motor of which the current WWTP has many,” Peavy said.

After the new centrifuge system is installed, the city would have the ability to use its excess tanker trucks to assist other local communities in Hamilton County by taking their sludge at lower rates than they currently pay, and transport the liquid waste back to the City of Jasper WWTP for processing. This could potentially create even more revenue for the city.

Centrisys Centrifuges are soon to be featured on an episode of Discovery Channel’s “How Stuff Works” highlighting its improvements to the wastewater industry.

“The key is now in the hands of the City of Jasper council members, the city

manager and the public to approve this new technology, enhancing a vital part of the wastewater system and the local community,” Peavy stated.