What is the smoke that’s coming out of the chimney?
Basically water vapour, so we’re creating our own clouds! We continuously measure and monitor the facility so we know for sure that nothing harmful comes out.
Our DESOTEC Community
We are proud to call the beautiful city of Roeselare our home. With its trading roots, historic landmarks, beautiful nature and wonderful people (some of them our colleagues), it is a special place. That is why we strive to be the best neighbour we can be. We conduct our business in an ethical, responsible and clean way, making sure all contaminants we remove for our customers are neutralized and nothing leaves our facility.
“It makes me proud to work at Desotec. When I go home in the evening, I can tell my son that I’ve helped to keep their world clean. I’m proud that this company is based in my hometown Roeselare.”
Caroline,
DESOTEC employee & resident of Roeselare
Some examples of our community involvement
The Warmathon
Our DESOTEC Warriors do not only strive for a brighter world during working hours, but also after that. The “Warmathon”, an initiative by Belgian organization “De Warmste Week”, is a yearly event on the DESOTEC calendar. During this day, a group of DESOTEC Warriors put on their running shoes and DESOTEC-branded t-shirt to run several miles together to support a charity of their choice. “Besides supporting a good cause, it is also a very fun event which results in great memories.”, according to Sporty Warrior Sarah.
Development of bioethanol for production of hand gel
The coronavirus pandemic made the alcohol demand for hand disinfectant gel explode. DESOTEC, as European market leader for mobile circular purification solutions, found the solution to deodorize bioethanol at the request of a chemical giant, and delivered a purification plant for this purpose very quickly and free of charge. In this way, a huge quantity of bioethanol was made suitable for increasing the production of hand gel very quickly.
Supporting local festivals with our purification solutions
DESOTEC supports local festivals to solve their purification needs. We sponsored a local festival in Belgium by offering a DESOTEC Activated Carbon Filter to purify waste water. By doing so, they were able to reduce their whole water consumption by half and we encouraged and stimulated water reuse from the dishwasher and clean shower water before it was disposed. Instead of sponsoring local festivals in the conventional way, we sponsor them with our solution to reduce the impact on the environment.
Come see for yourselves!
At the same time, we realise that not everyone in Roeselare will know exactly what we do, or how. We are aware that trucks and chimneys may be misleading and could cause concerns at times. But we care. In fact, we invite everyone who has questions to send an email and simply ask. We will gladly respond. Or ask for one of our facility tours and our DESOTEC Warriors will tell you everything you want to know. We can assure you our processes are clean, sustainable and all contaminants are neutralized so that nothing enters Roeselare, but sometimes it’s better to see for yourself. Let us make you part of our journey towards a cleaner planet!
FAQs
What is activated carbon used for?
You might know activated carbon from usage in kitchen suction hoods or tap water filters. Activated carbon even has such a large purification strength, it is used as (emergency) medicine in case of drug or alcohol overdosages!
We however use its purification strength for industrial applications, for example purifying air and water emissions. We help our customers overcome challenges, so they can safely manufacture products such as swimming pools, rubber boots, piano’s, petfood, cars, you name it! Almost all manufacturing companies can lower their environmental impact by using our circular filter solutions.
Is it very difficult to keep your factories clean?
Activated carbon produces black dust. That is why our facility is cleaned continuously and at each shift change. We make cleanliness very much a priority, because only a clean workspace can be a safe one. If you’re curious to see for yourself: you can always request a visit at nicetomeetyou@desotec.com.
How do you make sure that pollutants from waste carbon do not go into the environment?
Very important question! Health and safety of our employees and our neighbourhood is our absolute priority. All our waste carbon is safely stored with all required safety measures. This can for example be a completely air tight environment, temperature sensors and much more! Also contamination to soil and ground water are excluded by collecting all our own water, and of course treating it on activated carbon filters ourselves. Groundwater samples are also taken regularly to monitor the groundwater quality.
What happens inside the Desotec factories?
We call it our production facility, but in fact we do not produce but recycle! Recycling consists of 2 phases: the reactivation and the flue gas treatment.
1. Reactivation is a recycling process at high temperature and without oxygen. (Otherwise the carbon would burn like in your BBQ). Because of the increased temperature, the pollutants that were adsorbed are released from the carbon. Steam is used to create new pores in the carbon. The result: we have clean recycled carbon that can be used by our customers again. Of course this is again verified by the lab.
2. Flue gas treatment is the purification of the gasses coming from the reactivation process. This consists of an entire chain of different purification steps. The gases are burned to remove organic components. What’s left are basically salts and some metals. These are removed by adding neutralizing components. We even use our own filters as safety! As a result, all components are destroyed and this is continuously measured and sent to the government.