About the Hartebeesfontein Nereda WWTP
Hartbeesfontein is a settlement near Klerksdorp, in the North West province of South Africa.
The challenge
Hartebeesfontein wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) in Gauteng, South Africa processes effluent from households in nearby Kempton Park, as well as industrial sites in Spartan and Isando. One of 19 plants operated by the East Rand Water Care Company (ERWAT), the facility needed extending and upgrading to increase its treatment capacity from 45 megalitres per day to 50 – a plant capacity of more than 11%. The upgrade project was a collaborative effort between Royal HaskoningDHV and WEC Projects South Africa, which is the only company in South Africa licensed to supply and install Royal HaskoningDHV’s Nereda wastewater treatment technology. WEC was appointed for the design, manufacturing, installation and commissioning of the new five megalitre treatment facility.
Image: Nereda partners visiting Hartebeesfontein WWTP during Nereda Community Days 2016
The solution
Nereda technology is an innovative sustainable wastewater treatment that relies on aerobic biological action to purify wastewater before returning clean water to the environment. The main challenge for the project team at Hartebeesfontein was to retrofit this new technology by converting the existing 30-year-old water treatment tanks, comprising a thickener and a phostrip plant, into a buffer tank and a Nereda reactor. This design and build project combined part of the plant’s existing, outdated infrastructure with the Nereda plant’s technological solution, which now allows the entire wastewater treatment process to take place in just two tanks. The original tanks were not ideally configured for the installation of new equipment and controls, so a number of modifications were needed, requiring the team to draw on its creative engineering expertise, to design and deliver the finished project.
The outcome
The team looked at the Hartebeesfontein project as an exciting challenge and an opportunity to engineer a solution that combined existing infrastructure with the best and latest in innovative technology to come up with a design that maximised the plant’s efficiency.
