Innovative Beneficial Use of Reclaimed Materials

The YieldMaster 3500 series solids removal and recovery equipment was designed to be a disposal process for the dredge work that will completely avoid confined aquatic or confined upland disposal. All recovered solids could be utilized by a concrete or asphalt operation as a supplementary washed and dustless aggregate. This is a beneficial reuse of all the recoverable aggregate materials from dredge operations that will eliminate the need for land-based disposal or construction of an aquatic disposal site. 

The non-recoverable [silts & clays] mixture would be processed further to remove moisture down to approximately 35% then solidified with the addition of proprietary pozzolanic additives to create a structure that permanently fixates and stabilizes any contamination consolidated from washing the recoverable aggregate portion. This solidified material has value, and nothing is ever scheduled to go to landfill.

The equipment is completely portable, built on a 53’ trailer and can be connected to the local power supply or powered by a diesel generator in more remote locations. The operation can be run with three employees and will process 3,000 gallons per minute of dredge wash with up to 45% solids in slurry. All aspects of the recovery system have been designed to optimize the operation and minimize the downtime for service.

Land application of dredge material requires preprocessing to remove much of the water entrained and even then, if the mud came from a saltwater environment, there are limited options for land application. 

This washed material can be dialed into the grain size required by the end user. All the silts, clays and biological gels pass through the vibratory screens and are collected and consolidated internally for further processing. The wash water internally is constantly recycled, and the contamination drops into the consolidation area where the silts and clays accumulate for dewatering. The silts, clays and biological gels are removed by a progressive cavity pump that begins the process of removal of the excess water while moving the material to a vertical cuttings dryer that brings the moisture down to 35% or less and all water is brought back to the equipment internally for reuse.

Material from the cutting dryer can then be further processed.