The U.S. Poultry & Egg Association (USPOULTRY) this week awarded the 2016 Clean Water Award to Sanderson Farms of Kinston, North Carolina, and Tyson Foods of Russellville, Arkansas.
The award, chosen by a committee of industry engineers, industry managers, university personnel and industry media, is presented annually to poultry facilities excelling in their efforts at water reclamation.
Awards are presented in two categories–full treatment and pretreatment. The full treatment category covers plants that treat wastewater to a standard of quality that allows the facility to discharge into a receiving stream or final land application system. The pretreatment category includes facilities that discharge pretreated effluent to a publicly-owned, full treatment facility for further treatment. To be eligible, a facility must have a minimum of two years of no significant non-compliances or notices of violations or any other type of enforcement action.
Sanderson Farms’ broiler processing plant in Kinston, North Carolina, the winner in the full treatment category, processes approximately 250,000 birds per day and generates an average wastewater flow of 1.4 million gallons per day utilizing numerous processes including biological treatment, oxygenation, clarification and ultra-violent disinfection.
Tyson Food’s Russellville, Arkansas further processing facility, the winner in the pretreatment category, treats an average of 200,000 thousand gallons of water per day. The facility recently installed a supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system to more efficiently monitor and operate dissolve air flotation (DAF) units, flow meters, tanks, pumps and other equipment remotely.
The press release announcing the awards is available here.
