[Performance and substrate inhibition kinetics model of nitritation process in inverse turbulent bed reactor]

The performance of a nitritation inverse turbulent bed (ITB) reactor was tested and the substrate inhibition kinetics characteristics of the reactor were analyzed. The results showed that a rapid reactor startup could be realized within 20 d with a strategy that combined the biofilm attachment method named "precoating carrier treatment" and "rapid suspending sludge discharge", with the feeding strategy named "low strength, high load". When operated at a hydraulic retention time of 3 h and influent NH4(+) -N of 700 mg x L(-1), corresponding to a nitrogen loading rate of 5.60 kg x (m3 x d)(-1), a maximum NH4(+) -N removal rate of 4.25 kg x (m3 x d)(-1) was observed. The maximum NO2(-) -N production rate was as high as 3.70 kg x (m3 x d)(-1). Four inhibition kinetic models (Haldane, Edwards, Aiba and Luong) were analyzed through non-linear regression to represent the inhibitions caused by substrate of nitritation process and the parameters of models were gained, which were r(max) of 1.84 kg x (m3 x d)(-1), K(IH) of 97.4 mg x L(-1) and K(m) of 0.188 mg x L(-1) for Haldane model, and r(max) of 1.83 kg x (m3 x d)(-1) and K(IA) of 114 mg x L(-1) for Aiba model. It was proposed that Haldane and Aiba models well fitted the process data harvested in the ITB reactor.