Airports

NAWE has extensive experience in designing simple, low-cost, ecological systems to drive specific treatment reactions for our industrial clients. Our engineered wetland systems, in-situ phyto- and bioremediation systems and engineered soil-matrix biofilters help our customers achieve exceptional business and environmental results. NAWE's industrial clients fall into the following sectors.

Remediation
Water Reuse
Airport Deicing Fluids
Mine Tailings
Landfill Leachate
Biodiesel Processing Wastewater
Agricultural Wastewater

Airports
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) requires airlines and airports that operate during icy conditions to perform deicing and anti-icing of aircraft and airfield pavement. While this ensures the safety of passengers and cargo operations, under the EPA's 2004 Effluent Guidelines Plan, it can pose environmental impacts if airports do not properly manage their deicing liquid and stormwater runoff. Relatively concentrated, spent aircraft deicing liquid may be collected from beneath aircraft for recycle or disposal at a local wastewater treatment plant, but a significant part of liquid at every airport will end up in stormwater sewers and ditches, be blown by jet or prop wash onto areas adjacent to deicing pads, drip off onto aprons and runways during aircraft movement, or be collected with removed snow and ice.

Surface flow wetlands have been used at a number of airports around the world to treat waste from deicing liquid, and are a viable option where there is adequate available space. However, with NAWE’s unique patented Forced Bed Aeration™ a subsurface flow wetland can be designed to treat deicing fluid with a much a smaller physical footprint, saving valuable real estate. One of the benefits of the use of subsurface wetlands is the water is below ground and does not attract birds, avoiding the risk of causing bird air strikes. In addition, engineered wetlands can be passively operated and constructed in un-utilized areas within the airport saving both infrastructure and long term O&M costs.

Buffalo Niagara International Airport (Buffalo, New York)
The Buffalo Niagara International Airport (BNIA) utilizes propylene glycol as deicing fluid during the winter months. To reduce the quantity of glycol discharged to the sewage plant or stormwater flows, BNIA contracted with NAWE and teaming partner Jacques Whitford to conduct a treatability study and develop a conceptual design for a subsurface wetland system that can treat and dispose of the spent deicing liquid onsite.