Wastewater Characteristics of a Truck Wash/Service Facility

[gt5879c]

Hello All,

I am designing a decentralized wastewater system for a truck wash/service facility. This facility will service and wash over the road trucks and trailers for a national carrier. There will also be a couple of restrooms and a kitchen facility in the building. I am thinking that the wastewater will have a high COD content, low BOD, and low solids. I am planning to put an oil-water separator at the facility upstream of the treatment plant. How would I obtain or estimate the wastewater characteristics of a facility like this? The owner doesn't have any information to give me. I need to know my influent characteristics to be able to be sure that my effluent characteristics are meeting the limits.

Thanks

 

[bimr]

You can contact an installation. Manufacturers of wastewater supply systems for these installations should also have access to wastewater characterics.

 

[tkall]

You might want to check with you local EPA office if you plan on discharging to groundwater or surface water. For a sub-surface discharge a truck wash facility will be treated as a class V shallow injection well (I think). For instance, a minute amount of ...you pick...brake cleaner, diesel, CCl4..in the wash water can cause big problems for the facility owner. One way to to deal with this is to simply discharge to the ground surface...not sub-surface.
Tom
Squirtonsite.com
eliminite.com

 

[gt5879c]

Tom, is this still an issue if we have an oil/water separator upstream of the treatment plant?

 

[tkall]

It may be. I would contact EPA and....get it in writing. Some detectable concentration of some organic compound may require that you dispose of the entire contents of the oil-water separator as hazardous waste.