Training for plant operators and supervisors
Hands-on training, live or online, that helps operating staffs become certified and confident. We have trained operators at plants in the United States and Canada.
Classes and topics we teach
Every class and topic stands on its own, from the headworks to solids handling, the lab and the control room, including reading P&IDs and preparing for the certification exam. Choose the ones your staff needs, or ask us to put a custom set together.
Fundamentals and certification
- Treatment overview: influent to effluent
- Why we treat wastewater: cBOD, TSS, ammonia, phosphorus and what they do to a river
- Operator math: the pounds formula (8.34), loadings, detention time, flow
- Certification exam preparation: process, math and lab questions
- Practice exams, worked math problems, answer keys
- Laboratory basics for the exam
Reading P&IDs and plant drawings
- Symbols, lines, valves and instrument tags
- Process flow diagrams and plant schematics
- Valve schedules and valve lineups: knowing which option you are running
- Setpoint tables and control narratives
- Drawings in troubleshooting, startup and training
Laboratory and process control testing
- TSS, BOD, ammonia, Standard Methods, QA/QC
- Operational field tests: settleometer, OUR and SOUR
- Microscope work and identifying filaments
- Sampling, and checking instruments against the lab
- Reading the monthly operating report
Permits, NPDES and reporting
- The Clean Water Act and NPDES permits
- Reading your permit limits
- Monthly operating reports: checking the numbers
- Calculating an exceedance in pounds
- Biosolids rules for hauling and land application
Safety
- Digester gas, methane and H2S safety
- Confined space entry
- Lockout/tagout and electrical isolation
- High-speed rotating equipment
- Pressure vessels, steam and nitrogen
Headworks and primary treatment
- Screening and grit: equipment, operation, troubleshooting
- How headworks affects every process downstream
- Sedimentation, sludge and scum removal
- Primary clarifier performance and math
Activated sludge and secondary treatment
- Heterotrophs, nitrifiers, protozoa and filaments
- Indicator organisms and sludge age
- Dissolved oxygen, aeration and blower problems
- SRT, MCRT, sludge age and F/M
- RAS and WAS control to hold a target SRT
- Settleability: SSV30 and SVI
- Operating a healthy secondary process
- Daily process control routine: what to check, adjust, and how long to wait
- Foam, bulking, rising sludge and filaments
- Storm flow and high flow operation
- Secondary treatment math
Nutrient removal
- Nitrification and denitrification: MLE and anoxic zones
- Alkalinity balance and pH
- Ammonia control and winter nitrification
- Biological selectors
- Biological phosphorus removal and phosphorus-accumulating organisms
- Chemical phosphorus removal
- Nitrogen removal in a membrane bioreactor
Secondary clarifiers
- How secondary clarifiers work
- Surface overflow, solids and weir loading, detention time
- Sludge blanket control and sludge removal
- Optimizing clarifiers during high flow
- Troubleshooting clarifier problems
Disinfection and effluent quality
- UV disinfection and effluent E. coli limits
- Post-aeration and effluent dissolved oxygen
- How effluent solids affect disinfection
Solids handling and dewatering
- Know your sludges: what comes in, how thick
- Thickening: gravity, rotary screen and gravity belt thickeners
- Storage basins, raw sludge pumps, valve lineups
- Polymer: how it works, dose math, jar testing
- Centrifuge dewatering: parts, startup, operation, shutdown, adjustments, troubleshooting
- Screw press operation and troubleshooting
- Dewatering mass balance and solids capture
- Cake production, hauling and biosolids
- Thermal hydrolysis (THP) systems
- Dissolved air flotation (DAF) and biological contactor (HRBC) systems
Anaerobic digestion
- The four biological stages, sludge to methane
- Alkalinity, volatile acids and the VA/ALK ratio
- Mixing, heating and heat exchangers
- Feeding and withdrawing sludge
- Digester gas: quality, systems, burners, flares
- Digester math: HRT, VS loading, VS reduction, gas production
- Commissioning a new digester, including nitrogen purging and seeding
- Upsets: souring, temperature loss, mixing loss, foaming, FOG slugs
Odor control
- Foul air and H2S: why we treat it
- Biofilter operation: air, water and bed
- Odor math: empty bed residence time, H2S loading, removal
SCADA, instrumentation and controls
- Control loops, interlocks and alarms
- Reading SCADA trends
- Screening data for flatlines, spikes and drift
- Checking analyzers against the lab
- HMI setpoints and controller logic
- When the PLC goes down, and restarting after a stop
Operations and maintenance
- Startup, normal operation and shutdown procedures
- Commissioning new processes and equipment
- Daily rounds and checklists
- Pumps, blowers, mixers and valves for operators
- Process optimization and energy savings
- Writing and using a plant O&M manual
Troubleshooting
- A systematic method: confirm, define, check, adjust one thing at a time
- Reading symptoms: what you see and what it means
- Alarm response and first actions
- Real operating days as case studies
Using AI for plant performance
- AI as a troubleshooting partner
- Writing good prompts for operators
- Checking every AI answer with math, the lab and instruments
- Guardrails: AI advises, operators decide
- Plant document libraries and document control
- Data security basics
Don’t see a topic you need? Ask. Live training is built around your plant, and online training covers general topics only.
Live or online
Live, plant-specific package
Training in person at your plant, built around your plant. The package includes:
- A plant-specific O&M manual, written by operators for operators
- The training
- Plant-specific training materials
- Process control workbooks, which are interactive and can be tied to SCADA
Online training
Online training is general training for operators. It does not include the plant-specific package.
The manual is the core of the package. Our manuals are electronic, illustrated and written by operators for operators, so your staff trains from a document they will actually use. See our O&M manuals.
Centrifuge dewatering
A decanter centrifuge separates water from sludge with speed and a scroll that conveys the solids. The class covers the parts, startup, operation, shutdown, adjustments and troubleshooting.
Using AI for plant performance
AI can help operators troubleshoot, as long as every answer is checked and an operator makes the decision. This is the five-step workflow taught in the class.
Wastewater Academy
Our online training and CEU classes are coming soon. For now, we arrange live, online and in-house plant-specific training directly with you.
Some of our training projects include
We have trained operators at hundreds of treatment plants. These are some of them.
Indiana, 10 mgd plant
We have trained here 26 of the last 29 years. Twelve operators went from few certified to all certified, seven at Class IV, and the plant placed 2nd in the state operator competition.
Indiana, 20 mgd plant
Operator training, O&M manual development, and process optimization.
Trinity River Authority, Texas
150+ mgd. Activated sludge control, selectors, and nutrient removal.
Hyperion WWTP, California
450 mgd. We directed Power Restart and Digester Screening training.
British Columbia
Startup training at two regional plants.
Utoy Creek WWTP, Georgia
44 mgd. We evaluated training and staffing needs and developed startup training.
In-house training at your plant
In-house training, including the full plant-specific package, is arranged with us directly. Contact us to plan training for your staff.