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Environmental

In the Environmental industry, dealing with materials like soils, tailings, and sludge, which often stick together, can lead to difficulties in their flow. And when handling materials shaped like flakes or fibers, such as ground plastic or wood chips, it's essential to design equipment that considers the flow properties to avoid challenges and comply with environmental regulations.

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Overview

Environmental Industry

Reliable handling of waste streams will reduce operator exposure to toxic materials.

The Environmental industry encompasses many bulk material handling applications including radioactive waste, soil remediation, municipal sludge, hazardous waste removal, post-consumer product recycling (e.g., glass, plastic, paper, cardboard), and nuclear waste vitrification (glass encasement).

Environmental applications often involve regulatory agencies (e.g., US Environmental Protection Agency, US Department of Energy), waste collection services, municipal processing facilities, and research/development groups that focus on testing of new technologies for collecting, receiving, processing, and recycling of a waste stream.

Compressed flat aluminum cans for recycling.

Scrap metal at a recycling center.

Services

Environmental Industry Services

Whether you need to safely retrieve calcined nuclear waste (raffinate) from sealed concrete storage bins, add chemicals or water to contaminated soils for treatment at a hazardous site, or perform sludge processing such as dewatering, drying, or pelletizing, Jenike & Johanson can help you meet your Environmental industry needs.

On-site assessment of material flow issues
On-site material testing of toxic, hazardous waste
Silo and feeder design for waste products
Pneumatic conveying tests of powders, pellets
Belt-to-belt transfer transfer chute design
Modeling of new solids handling technology

Engineers extracting a sample of waste material.

Environmental soils.

Challenge

Common Environmental Industry Challenges

The materials handled in the Environmental industry, such as soils, tailings, and sludge, typically have high cohesive strength, leading to poor flow. Bulk solids that are shaped like flakes or fibers, such as ground plastic, shredded tires, or wood chips, can interlock to form arches, resulting in large masses of non-flowing material. Flow problems such as these can result in high cost and wasted time. The key to success in designing reliable equipment for these difficult-to-handle materials is determining the flow properties of the materials for the equipment design basis while complying with environmental regulatory requirements.

Transporting dredged materials by barge.

Materials

Common Materials Handled

Here is a shortened list of some of the most common bulk materials we have successfully handled in the Environmental industry to date. Please reach out to us if you’d like to discuss our experience with your specific material.