The Hardap treatment plant produces drinking water mainly for Mariental, the irrigation farmers and the tourist resort at Hardap.
The treatment of water starts at the flash mixer, where the flocculant and chlorine are added to the water. The flocculant is dosed for the process of flocculation to start and the chlorine is dosed to kill any micro-organisms that may be in the water. Unlike most other plants, Hardap uses caustic soda instead of lime, to reduce the corrosivity of the water when necessary.
From the flash mixer the water flows through the flocculation channels, where the flocculant binds the suspended clay particles into bigger particles referred to as “floc”.
From the flocculation channels, the water ends up in the clarifier for the next treatment step. In the clarifier, the floc sinks to the bottom, while the clean water with some smaller suspended particles overflows into a concrete channel taking the water to the next treatment step.
The next step is the filtration process. During filtration, the water seeps through sand filters finally collecting in the clearwater well , just bellow the sand filters.
In this well, the water is again disinfected by adding a chlorine solution.
The water is then transferred to storage reservoirs before distribution to our bulk customers.
