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Laboratory-determined Phosphorus Flux from Lake Sediments as a Measure of Internal Phosphorus Loading

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Simultaneous phosphorus and nitrogen removal in a continuous-flow two-sludge system.

Xiang-Kun Li¹, Rong-Xin Huang, Lin-Lin Bao

¹School of Municipal and Environmental Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150090, China. xkli312@sohu.com

Journal of Environmental Sciences (China)

|January 7, 2010

Summary

This study resolved competition for organic matter in wastewater treatment, enabling simultaneous biological phosphorus and nitrogen removal. The novel two-sludge system effectively removes pollutants even with low C/N ratios.

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Area of Science:

Environmental Engineering
Microbiology
Wastewater Treatment Technologies

Background:

Simultaneous biological phosphorus and nitrogen removal is crucial for wastewater treatment.
Traditional systems face challenges with competing microorganisms for organic substrates.
Adapting to varying influent characteristics, like low COD/TN ratios, remains a challenge.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate simultaneous biological phosphorus and nitrogen removal in a novel two-sludge system.
To resolve the competition between denitrifying bacteria and phosphorus accumulating organisms (PAOs) for organic substrates.
To evaluate system performance under low influent COD/TN ratios and optimize operational parameters.

Main Methods:

A lab-scale continuous-flow two-sludge system was employed.
Alternating anaerobic, anoxic conditions, and contact oxidation stages were utilized.
Long-term experiments were conducted to assess pollutant removal and optimize sludge retention time (SRT) and bypass sludge flow rate (BFR).

Main Results:

The system successfully resolved substrate competition, enabling simultaneous removal.
High removal efficiencies were achieved: 81.78% for COD, 92.51% for TP, 75.75% for TN, and 84.47% for NH4-N.
Optimal influent C/N ratio was determined to be between 4-5, with BFR around 0.35.

Conclusions:

The developed two-sludge system effectively achieves simultaneous biological phosphorus and nitrogen removal from municipal wastewater.
The system demonstrates robustness in adapting to low influent COD/TN ratios.
Optimized SRT and BFR are critical for efficient operation and pollutant removal.