Improving Anaerobic Digested Sludge Dewaterability through Gamma-Ray Irradiation and Struvite Precipitation
Publication: Journal of Environmental Engineering
Volume 144, Issue 2
Abstract
Anaerobic digestion is a generally used microbial process in wastewater treatment plants, and anaerobic digestion sludge often possesses unacceptable characteristics including high resistance to solid-liquid separation and high concentration of nutrients, such as phosphorus and nitrogen. Gamma-ray irradiation was used to improve the dewaterability of anaerobic digestion sludge, and the struvite (magnesium ammonium phosphate) precipitation method was utilized to recover increased orthophosphate () and ammonium nitrogen () from the postirradiation liquor. An absorbed dose of 5–15 kGy would be potentially successful for dewaterability improvement, and the optimal dewaterability occurred at 10 kGy, which could reduce the water content of sludge cake from 80.08 to 73.46%. The mechanism for the enhanced dewaterability was also analyzed, and the lysis of extracelluar polymeric substances and reduction of particle surface charges were found to be the major reasons. Furthermore, the recovery rate of and were 86.07 and 15.08%, respectively, under the condition of Mg/P of 1.8 (molar ratio), pH 9.6, and reaction time of 30 min.
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Acknowledgments
The research was supported by National Nature Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 51378247). The authors deeply appreciate their financial support.
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Published In
Journal of Environmental Engineering
Volume 144 • Issue 2 • February 2018
Copyright
©2017 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jan 9, 2017
Accepted: Jul 26, 2017
Published online: Dec 4, 2017
Published in print: Feb 1, 2018
Discussion open until: May 4, 2018
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