The Easterly Wastewater Treatment Facility in Cleveland , Ohio which is part of the Northeastern Ohio Regional Sewer District has over 6,000 linear feet of channels were the wastewater flow is routed to and from various process components within the system. These channels cannot be by-passed or drained for access without disrupting the treatment processes and system hydraulics. The residence time of the wastewater as it travels through these channels can cause the residual dissolved oxygen to drop to the point that it causes process problems at the influent to the treatment tanks by resulting in a significant oxygen uptake. Biosolids, grit particles and other settleable solids were causing maintenance and capacity problems within all the common channels. The channels were previously equipped with air diffuser manifolds with drilled open-port air discharge orifices. The entire manifolds filled with biosolids when the air manifolds were shutdown, resulting in the orifice openings becoming clogged. These assemblies were also unable to resuspend solids along the channel bottom due to the installation height of the orifice above the channel floor.

    The district decided to utilize Tideflex check valve diffusers to eliminate the clogging problems as well as enhance the overall mixing by orienting the diffuser units with the discharge point near the channel floor. Tideflex Technologies provided the district with 470 removable aeration channel assemblies, these assemblies were constructed of schedule 10 – 316L stainless steel and equipped with Victaulic® Brand stainless steel rigid couplings and valves. All support brackets and hardware were also provided; all these components were provided by Tideflex Technologies as a packaged system for each assembly ready for installation.