Abstract |
Liquid wastes from commerical laundries which can contaminate water contain 'soil,' starch, dye traces, and lint removed from fabrics plus residuals of washing agents, alkali, and other chemicals. Apprecialbe waste reduction can be accomplished by avoiding over-use of washing agents and the control of washer loads in order to achieve the optimum ratio between washing agents and clothing load. A very large portion of commercial laundry wastes are discharged directly to municipal sewage systems and treated in admixture with domestic sewage. Considerable experimental work on the separate treatment of laundry wastes with trickling filters is reported in the literature. In actual practice, some laundry wastes are being treated by chemical flocculation and sedimentation. Further purification may be obtained by lagooning and sand filtration. (Author) |