Effect of carbon-to-nitrogen ratio on high-rate nitrate removal in an upflow sludge blanket reactor for polluted raw water pre-treatment application

Sustainable Environment Research - Tập 31 Số 1 - 2021
Seow Wah How1, Choo Xiang Ting1, Jing Ying Yap1, Ching Yi Kwang1, Chee Keong Tan1, Wilasinee Yoochatchaval2, Kazuaki Syutsubo3, Adeline Seak May Chua1
1Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Malaya, 50603, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
2Department of Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Kasetsart University, Bangkok 10900, Thailand
3Center for Regional Environmental Research, National Institute for Environmental Studies, Tsukuba 305-8506, Japan

Tóm tắt

AbstractThe drinking water treatment plants (DWTPs) in the developing countries urgently need an efficient pre-treatment for nitrate (NO3−) removal to cope with the increasing NO3−pollution in raw water. An upflow sludge blanket (USB) reactor applied for NO3−removal from domestic wastewater may be adopted by the DWTPs. However, studies on the optimal carbon-to-nitrogen ratio (C/N) and operation of USB reactor at short hydraulic retention times (HRT) for high-rate polluted raw water pre-treatment are lacking. In this study, we first investigated the optimal C/N for biological NO3−removal in a sequencing batch reactor (SBR). An USB reactor was then operated with the optimal C/N for pre-treating synthetic raw water contaminated with NO3−(40 mg N L− 1) to monitor the NO3−removal performance and to examine opportunities for reducing the HRT. After operating the SBR with designed C/N of 4, 3 and 2 g C g− 1N, we selected C/N of 3 g C g− 1N as the optimal ratio due to the lower carbon breakthrough and nitrite (NO2−) accumulation in the SBR. The USB reactor achieved complete NO3−and NO2−removal with a lower designed C/N of 2 g C g− 1N due to the longer sludge retention time when compared with that of SBR (10 d). The high specific denitrification rate (18.7 ± 3.6 mg N g− 1mixed liquor volatile suspended solids h− 1) suggested a possible HRT reduction to 36 min. We successfully demonstrated an USB reactor for high-rate NO3−removal, which could be a promising technology for DWTPs to pre-treat raw water sources polluted with NO3−.

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Sustainable Environment Research

Tập 31 Số 1

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