A new water treatment plant has been installed by Harwin at its UK headquarters and manufacturing facility in Portsmouth.
With the investment the company is aiming to improve the quality of finish of its plated parts and reduce the environmental impact it makes.
The new plant, which uses resin filter technology, supplied by PureTech, cleans all the rinse water and recycles it back into the plating area.
The heavy metals – gold and tin – cleansed from the water can be reclaimed. Although this is already a common practice for gold, it is an industry first to reclaim the tin using this process.
Andrew McQuilken, CEO at Harwin said: “We should also see an improvement in the water quality used in the plating line, which will help maintain a high-quality of plating finish on our products.
Currently, by using standard tap water, the level of conductivity in the water is typically 400-600 microsiemens – recycled water after treatment will be below five microsiemens. Moreover, this new investment puts us ahead of immanent European legislation.”
Harwin
