Pioneers in environmental management

Jordi Cararach - Bioibérica environmental management technician

At Bioibérica we treat an average flow of 500,000 litres of wastewater every day. This wastewater comes from our product manufacturing processes. This is the wastewater stored in the tank, and now we will show you the different parts of the process for attaining cleaned wastewater.

Oil and grease, as well as solids dissolved in the wastewater, are removed at this facility to prepare the water for biological treatment.

"Bioibérica pioneered the implementation of environmental management processes in 1994" 

The biological origin of our raw material means that the wastewater which enters the plant has a very high biodegradability index. This enables the application of biological treatment using activated sludge. The wastewater is brought into contact with a series of bacteria inside the reactor which drastically reduce the contaminants dissolved in the water.

"This treatment plant could clean the water of a city of 35,000 inhabitants"

Throughout the day, different personnel collect various process data and samples at the facility. These checks mean we can cut our discharge parameters to around three times below the legal limit for discharge into the public sewer.

"The water has an average degree of contamination (DQO) of under 400mg/litre (3 times below the legal limit)"

What we do here is physically decant the sludge to obtain concentrated sludge which is reintroduced into the reactor and clean water to send to the sewerage network.

"Bioiberica has obtained the ISO 14.001 and EMAS environmental certifications" 

This treatment makes the water suitable for reuse in some productive processes avoiding taking extra water from the well and not depleting natural resources.