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permaculture - Re: plant beds for treatment of rinse water from metal sculpture studio

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  • From: Bob <rmhoward@omninet.net.au>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: plant beds for treatment of rinse water from metal sculpture studio
  • Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2000 17:06:54 +0800


All the things that Mindy Vanderford suggested make lots of sense. I'd
suggest that you
separate out your waste streams at source so that you develop different
treatment
processes for each kind of rinse water. So you have one drum into which you
settle
acidic waste another into which you settle alkaline cleaners, another into
which you
settle glycol ether contaminated water - how possible this is I don't know as
I don't
know enough about sculpting techniques - if you have to deal with a mixture
then treat
the water consecutively through each system.

I'd say it would be worth your while doing an inventory on the heavy metal
elements that
you were using as these _can't_ be broken down only redistributed. Apart from
Iron and
zinc what other metals are you using under the heading of mixed media (heavy
metal
colors are a likely problem).?

Hope this helps

BOb HOward



Catherine Jo Morgan wrote:

> I'm looking for advice on how to use plants to clean rinse water of
> various VOCs like various glycol ethers, also sometimes very alkaline
> metal cleaners, other times acidic zinc/phosphoric acid metal cleaners.
> All the materials are waterbased, and the rinse water has a pretty low
> concentration of the materials. It seems possible that the right
> selection of plants, in some kind of special treatment area, could clean
> the water from my studio before it reaches groundwater.
>
> I'm a sculptor, making iron and mixed media bowls. I'm concerned about
> how to treat the rinse water from cleaning the iron and from washing paint
> brushes. I'm using the least toxic materials I can find. Even so, there
> are chemicals I use that I'd rather not drink. My studio is about 35 feet
> uphill from our well. I have no septic tank, just pour rinse water into
> 5-gallon buckets. I generate perhaps 2 to 4 gallons of rinse water a day,
> so I could carry it to a water treatment system a hundred feet or more
> from the well - if I had one.
>
> I'm located in the foothills of the Blue Ridge, in northeast Georgia.
> First frost is usually mid-October, last frost usually early to mid-April.
> The land here is acidic, clay, covered with mostly hardwoods, some pine,
> with light undergrowth. Not much of the land is cleared, and most of that
> is under the electricity lines. But if sunshine is necessary, I could
> probably locate the treatment area in a sunny area. There's just a lot
> more shady woods to choose from.
>
> I'd greatly appreciate information and leads on how to set up such a
> system, what to consider in designing it, what plants to use, etc. All
> help will be much appreciated.
>
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