Role of Solids Retention Time on Complete Nitrification: Mechanistic Understanding and Modeling
Publication: Journal of Environmental Engineering
Volume 140, Issue 1
Abstract
Effects of solids retention time (SRT) on both steps of the nitrification process (e.g., ammonia oxidation and nitrite oxidation) and the nitrifier community in a complete-mix activated sludge process were studied. At a SRT less than or equal to 20 days, the effluent ammonia concentration was lower than the effluent nitrite concentration. At the 40-day SRT, however, the effluent nitrite concentration became equal to or less than the effluent ammonia concentration. Quantitative Polymerase Chain Reaction (QPCR) assays indicated that increasing SRT significantly increased nitrite-oxidizing bacteria/ammonia-oxidizing bacteria (NOB/AOB) ratio. Further investigation indicated that Nitrosomonas europaea/eutropha were the dominant AOB for ammonia oxidation under all SRTs. However, for nitrite oxidation, Nitrobacter-like NOB played the key role at low SRTs, while Nitrospira-like NOB played the key role at high SRTs. Modeling results indicated that, for AOB and NOB, the values of maximum specific growth rate () were 0.24 and , respectively, while the values of decay coefficient () were 0.066 and , respectively. The half-velocity constants () for both AOB and NOB were approximately , and the maximum specific substrate utilization rate () for AOB and NOB were 1.3 and -VSS-day, respectively. These values suggest that AOB had an advantage over NOB at a lower SRT, mainly because AOB grew faster than NOB did. On the contrary, the increased NOB/AOB ratio at a longer SRT was likely due to NOB having a smaller . The very low values for both AOB and NOB imply that a plug-flow reactor may not have much kinetic advantage over a complete-mixed reactor for a complete nitrification process. The mass concentrations of AOB and NOB in the activated sludge can also be calculated based on the measured nitrification capacity and their value.
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Acknowledgments
This research was partially supported by a grant from the Army Research Lab (ARL) through Leonard Wood Institute (LWI) and Frontier Environmental Technology, LLC. Other support was from the Environmental Research Center (ERC) at the Missouri University of Science and Technology. The authors gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Ms. Shreya Ghosh, Mr. Adam Martin, Dr. Daniel Oerther, Dr. Melanie Mormile, and Mr. Daniel Roush at the Missouri University of Science and Technology and Ms. Atreyee Sims and Dr. Zhiqiang Hu at the University of Missouri–Columbia during this research.
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Published In
Journal of Environmental Engineering
Volume 140 • Issue 1 • January 2014
Pages: 48 - 56
Copyright
© 2014 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Mar 24, 2013
Accepted: Sep 3, 2013
Published online: Sep 5, 2013
Published in print: Jan 1, 2014
Discussion open until: Feb 5, 2014
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