Underground water area rehabilitation project in Hungary financed by the Hungarian government to save the environment of the river Sió's using membrane technology

Abstract

This article is a case study about a real environmental project in Hungary that is financed by the Hungarian Government. The main task of the project is to re-cultivate the area of an old leather factory in the town of Simontornya, including soil exchange and underground water rehabilitation. This article itself mainly gives detailed technological information about the underground water treatment process, but also basic information about the recultivation parts of the whole project. The basic question of the underground water treatment project was how to withdraw 168,000 m3 of highly polluted underground water, remove the very heavily polluted metals and salts (arsenic, boron, chrome, ammonia, nitrate, chloride) and infiltrate the treated water back into the ground, all over a period of 2 years. The solution implemented is an integrated membrane system (NF; RO) including conventional physical and chemical pre-treatment and softening, with a selective ion exchange process for post-treatment. One further key aspect of the technology applied was to minimise the waste created during the whole process.