can treat nearly twice the volume of its oily waste water.

The Oily Waste water Treatment Plant, located on the southeast corner of BELCO's Serpentine Road, Pembroke property, was designed to treat oily waste water or any products the company produces which contain oily water.

Under construction since last October, the plant has the capacity to treat a maximum of 150 gallons of oily water per minute. The current average treatment volume is 90 gallons per minute.

The oily water enters the plant is passed through a device called a coalescer which removes any of the free oil.

The water then passes through another piece of equipment called a dissolved air flotation (DAF) unit, at this stage a polymer is added to break any oil in water emulsions.

The DAF unit then removes any free or emulsified oil. After the completion of this step, the clean water contains minute traces of less than 15 parts per million of oil and can be returned to the ground water system via boreholes on the property.

The oil which has been separated undergoes further processing through heating and addition of other chemicals to remove any remaining water.

The waste oil is then kept in insulated, heated storage tanks and is sent overseas for disposal.

Prior to the completion of the facility, all oily water at BELCO was treated through a standard gravity separation method which involved a visual inspection.

"This new plant due to its greater efficiency will not only dramatically improve the quality of the water being discharged,'' BELCO president Garry Madeiros said, "but also has the capability to treat a substantially higher volume of water than the old method.'' And he added that the new plant was another example of BELCO's "ongoing commitment to the environment''.