Choosing Matec helps reduce slurry management costs
Let’s see how a Matec plant works:

Purification cycle

1. Water from the washing of aggregates or from the cutting of marble or any other process is driven to the wastewater collection tank, which is made of concrete to our specifications. The tank collects all the water to be purified.
2. From the collection tank, the Pemo vertical or submersible pump sends the water to the static decanters, whose capacity depends on the water flow/minute according to the hydraulic separation principle.
3. Along the way, the pipe lets in the “flocculant” polyelectrolyte, which is metered out according to the slurry contained in the water by the automatic metering system (automatic preparation of the polyelectrolyte).
4. The water is pumped into the slurry decanters, the slurry precipitates under the effect of the flocculant to the bottom of the cone.
5. The purified water overflows into the well and falls back into the freshwater tank, perfectly clarified and ready to be reused in production.
6. The slurry settled in the decanters falls through the automatically-opening pneumatic valve (normally closed) into the steel tank below, to be homogenised.
7. As soon as the level probes are coated in slurry in the slurry tank, they send a signal to the centrifugal pump and the filtration cycle starts. The slurry is driven into the filter press, which in the meantime has closed the plate pack to form 30 to 50 mm chambers depending on the material to be filtered.
8. The slurry is fed into the filter press, where it is dehydrated up to 80% into compact panels, which can be perfectly stacked and which, when the filter opens, fall and pack up in the special containment walls or in the lorry bodies, ready for disposal.
9. For safety reasons, the clarified water recovered from the filter press is taken to the wastewater wells to be clarified all over again.

Because of the 80% reduction by the filter press, the slurry volume becomes smaller, thus reducing:

• Handling costs, namely
• Excavator, slurry handling operators, transport by lorry

Disposal costs
Filter-pressed slurry can be flown back into the quarry or used as prescribed by the Ministry, since the features of this slurry, once pressed, meet the specifications laid down by the Ronchi Act on the environment, thus reducing the costs for disposal at the dumping ground

Water supply
90% of the water is perfectly clarified and reused; only the portion that has evaporated or is contained in the feedstock is replenished. This reduces the operating costs, which are much lower than with centrifuges or belt presses.