Australian Vinyls Corporation Pty Ltd
Media Statement - 8 February 2010
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Innovative recycling cuts water use by half
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Engineers at Australian Vinyls Corporation have applied leading thinking to water recycling technologies to recycle waste water and halve the company’s use of fresh water.
Officially opened today by the Premier of Victoria, the Hon. John Brumby MLA, the company’s water recycling plant will save 325 million litres of water a year, reducing reliance on Melbourne’s valuable drinking water supplies.
Australian Vinyls General Manager, Mr David Cooper said, “For the company, the investment in this recycling plant makes both economic and environmental sense, allows us to grow our business with reduced risk of water constraints and reduces embodied water in Australian-made vinyl products.”
The process of making vinyl resin, or PVC, requires a significant volume of high quality, low contamination water, all of which is currently purchased drinking water. The process also discharges waste water. Despite improving water efficiency over the past 10 years by almost 30 per cent, Australian Vinyls is one of the top 20 industrial users of potable water in Melbourne.
The company recognised that significant reductions in fresh water use could only be achieved with a large capital investment in water treatment and recycling. However, the necessary technology to recover water from the PVC production process had yet to be developed anywhere in the world, and an appropriate treatment plant technology needed to be tested and proven.
AV conducted a pilot plant evaluation of technologies and processes with the support of the plastics and chemicals industries association, PACIA, and EPA Victoria. The full-scale water recycling plant designed and built by the company’s engineers uses an innovative approach to existing water recycling and effluent treating technologies to provide the high grade water required by the resin manufacturing process.
In its 2007 Budget, the Victorian Government recognised the value of this full scale project and contributed $1.8 million to the project. The commissioned plant cost approximately $5.5 million.
With this new treatment plant, AV will halve its potable water intake and reduce its trade waste discharge by 70 per cent per annum. The water saving is equivalent to the water requirements of more than 2,200 households*.
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*Water consumption based on 2.6 person households consuming 155 litres per person per day per year.
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