The dairy production sector is facing a number of challenges with meeting all environmental concerns. Disposal of wastewater associated with milk house cleaning is typically 1000 liters per day of water, milk, and cleaning chemicals. Phosphates and milk in the wastewater released into the surface water systems will simulate algae growth and lower water oxygen levels detrimental to the healthy aquatic systems. Active chlorines react with organic materials and form compounds that may be hazardous suchas the carcinogenic trihalomethanes. Effective waste treatments systems are available and new ones being developed. To minimize the size and cost of treatment systems, there is a need to minimize the amount of waste being generated and reduce water, chemicals, and energy consumption. In North American there have been a few reported studies on reducing the water use during pipeline cleaning (Price et. al. (1976), Anderson (1992) and Cuthbertson al. (1996)). These studies modified the wash systems to recycle the detergent water. At Nova Scotia Agricultural College a research project is investigating opportunities to minimize water, chemical and energy use during cleaning with the subsequent waste reduction by testing various wash strategies, while maintaining the accepted standard cleaning cycles and sanitation standards.
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