Water Research 199 (2021) 117180

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Water Research
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/watres

Review

Removal of effluent organic matter with biofiltration for potable

reuse: A review and meta-analysis
Eric S. Peterson∗, R. Scott Summers
University of Colorado Boulder, Department of Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering, 607 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Biofiltration, historically used for biodegradable organic matter (BOM) removal in drinking water treat-
Received 5 February 2021 ment, is being increasingly applied for potable reuse which requires unique characterization. This review
Revised 15 April 2021
and meta-analysis evaluates BOM occurrence as part of bulk wastewater effluent organic matter (EfOM),
Accepted 18 April 2021
quantifies the roles of operational parameters to achieve EfOM removal in biofilters, and identifies re-
Available online 22 April 2021
search gaps which may be fruitful for understanding reuse biofilter performance. Literature data (n = 76)
Keywords: indicates EfOM has a high biodegradable fraction (median 26%), which after typical ozone doses is higher
Empty bed contact time (57%). A biofiltration performance dataset (n = 160 across 42 WWTP effluents) shows that EfOM removal
Ozone of 35–40% can be expected when design parameters are optimized. Specifically, higher EfOM removal is
Biological activated carbon achieved by adding pre-ozonation and use of biological activated carbon (BAC) media, with comparatively
BDOC smaller impacts of increasing ozone dose or increasing empty bed contact time under typical scenarios.
Total organic carbon
Combined, these factors strongly correlate with observed EfOM removal (r2 = 0.64) after accounting for
confounding by adsorptive removal in BAC media with fewer than 20,0 0 0 bed volumes treated. Future
research that quantifies the occurrence of BOM, biomass activity on filter media, steady-state removal by
BAC, and impacts of longer empty bed contact times in potable reuse scenarios could impact optimization
strategies to meet or exceed biofilter performance observed to date.
© 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction (DBP) precursors (Michael-Kordatou et al., 2015) and decreasing

Advanced treatment of municipal wastewater effluent is an in-
creasingly common strategy to reduce negative impacts of wastew-
ater treatment plant (WWTP) discharge on receiving waterbodies
or augment drinking water supplies through potable reuse. Rapid-
rate biologically active granular media filtration (biofiltration) is
well-established, especially in Europe, for removal of organic mat-
ter and contaminants in drinking water treatment (Terry and Sum-
mers, 2018) and is becoming widespread in advanced systems
to treat wastewater effluents (WWefs) (Gerrity et al., 2013). Or-
ganic matter (OM) in wastewater effluent includes both specific
compounds (e.g., pesticides, pharmaceuticals, personal care prod-
ucts, ozonation byproducts) and non-specific, bulk effluent organic
matter (EfOM), a fraction of which is biodegradable OM (BOM)
(Shon et al., 2006). Bulk EfOM represents the primary substrate
for aerobic heterotrophic growth in biofilters; its removal im-
proves water quality directly, by removing disinfection byproduct
∗
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: eric.peterson@colorado.edu (E.S. Peterson).
microbial growth potential in distribution systems (Weinrich et al.,
2010), and also indirectly by providing the carbon source needed
for metabolism of specific contaminants which occur at trace (i.e.,
secondary substrate) concentrations (Zearley and Summers, 2012).
In potable reuse, removal of bulk EfOM is also a specific design
parameter because total organic carbon (TOC) concentrations in
common wastewater effluents (6–9 mg/L) (Krasner et al., 2009)
exceed typical regulatory limits (e.g., 0.5–3 mg/L) (U.S. Environ-
mental Protection Agency, 2012; California Department of Public
Health, 2018; Florida Potable Reuse Commission, 2020). A range of
treatment technologies can be utilized to remove EfOM, including
reverse osmosis and activated carbon adsorption; however, biofil-
tration is a comparatively lower cost, lower energy usage approach
which is attractive for strategies seeking to optimize performance
and target water quality that is fit for purpose. (Gerrity et al., 2014;
Schimmoller and Kealy, 2014).
Removal of bulk EfOM with biofiltration has been reported
in a growing body of studies which collectively comprise differ-
ent source waters, pretreatments, and operating conditions; how-
ever, biofilter performance across these factors has not been well-

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.watres.2021.117180
0043-1354/© 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers
characterized. Most studies are logistically constrained to one or
two source waters and only a few operational conditions, thus
effects of water quality or biofilter operation can be site-specific
and difficult to generalize. Such generalization is needed to rec-
oncile the wide range of biofilter performance observed across
and within studies. For example, peered reviewed studies reporting
biofilter performance, as TOC or dissolved organic carbon (DOC) re-
moval, include: 3–15% (Ho et al., 2011), 6–30% (Arnold et al., 2018),
17–37% (Kalkan et al., 2011), 23–51%, (Farré et al., 2011), 22–63%
(Reungoat et al., 2011) and 59–76% (Chuang and Mitch, 2017). In
these and other studies, EfOM removal not only exceeds the av-
erage BOM removal achieved in drinking water rapid-rate biofil-
ters (i.e., 10% TOC removal without ozone and 15% removal after
ozone), but also the average total BOM fraction itself (20% and
30%) (Terry and Summers, 2018), and thus reuse biofilters require
unique characterization. The study goal was to quantitatively as-
sess biofiltration performance for EfOM removal on a wide range
of source waters and operational conditions to provide insight on
the resulting wide ranges in EfOM removal.
Reuse biofilters treating municipal wastewater effluent are im-
plemented using principles established for drinking water, given
that the ratio of EfOM to drinking water DOM is only 2 to 5 and
that many drinking water sources are impacted by wastewater dis-
charges. Thus, this analysis is focused on treatment of wastewa-
ter effluents through the lens of well-established drinking water
biofiltration (Urfer et al., 1997; Zhu et al., 2010; Basu et al., 2016;
Brown et al., 2016; Terry and Summers, 2018). Briefly, biofilter per-
formance is related to the amount and character of influent BOM
and the amount and activity of filter biomass, though in practice
rather inexact but more easily defined surrogates are used. BOM
is usually quantified as either biodegradable DOC (BDOC), a mea-
sure of the total, or ultimate, biodegradable fraction defined as
the change in DOC after long-term exposure to biomass; or, as-
similable organic carbon (AOC), a measure of readily biodegradable
OM defined as the growth of specific microbial species relative to
their growth on a reference substrate (Escobar and Randall, 2001).
Ozone pre-oxidation reacts with recalcitrant OM to increase the
BOM fraction (Huck, 1990). Biofilter performance is impacted by
influent water quality conditions (type and amount of BOM and
water temperature) which affect microbial activity and operating
conditions (empty bed contact time (EBCT) and media type) which
affect the amount of biomass. Use of granular activated carbon
(GAC) media is beneficial but complicates the steady-state biofilter
performance assessment as it may hold residual adsorption capac-
ity. Psuedo-first-order kinetic steady-state behavior based on plug-
flow hydraulics is a simplified but useful model of biofilter perfor-
mance. In this approach, once acclimated and at steady-state, BOM
removal is modeled to be independent of influent BOM concentra-
tion and thus can be reported on a relative (percent removal) basis
(Terry and Summers, 2018).
The specific objective was to address the following questions:
what level of EfOM removal can be expected with biofiltration, and
what are the contributions of operating conditions? The approach
taken was to first review the occurrence of BOM in wastewater
treatment plant effluents, both with and without pre-ozonation, to
establish a treatability baseline. Second, a biofiltration performance
database of EfOM removal paired to system operating parameters
was complied. The impacts of ozone dose, EBCT and media type
were then evaluated in three ways; 1) critical review of studies
which report the impact of each parameter with paired data, 2)
systematic evaluation of biofiltration performance in an internal
six WWef lab study, and 3) meta-analysis of data across all stud-
ies. The role of non-steady state adsorptive processes when using
biological activated carbon (BAC) media is addressed. Finally, a de-
scriptive model is used to evaluate the combined effects of the
treatment parameters on EfOM removal across all source waters
2
Water Research 199 (2021) 117180
in the meta-analysis dataset and recommendations for future re-
search are presented.
2. Methods
2.1. External data collection and screening criteria
Three databases were developed to address the specific objec-
tives. Both peer-reviewed and gray literature (e.g., conference pro-
ceedings, dissertations, utility reports) were investigated. The first
database assessed BOM occurrence in WWefs (n = 76 from 12
studies, Table SI 4.1). The second database assessed the transition
from GAC, a condition in which DOM removal is dominated by GAC
adsorption, to BAC, a condition in which DOM removal is domi-
nated by biodegradation of BOM (n = 50 from 21 studies, Table SI
5.1). The most extensive database was developed from studies that
reported BOM removal from EfOM by biofiltration and the asso-
ciated biofilter operating parameters (n = 286). Forty two studies
on biofiltration of municipal wastewater EfOM that reported all of
the following criteria were retained in this database: 1) biofilter
influent TOC or DOC concentration, 2) BOM removal, reported as
absolute or percent change in TOC or DOC concentration, 3) ozone
dose or specific ozone dose (O3 /TOC, mg/mg), 4) EBCT, 5) granular
media type, either inert (typically sand or anthracite) or BAC, and
6) for BAC media, the throughput (in bed volumes) treated before
sampling. Studies using BAC media for which prior throughput was
unknown were also included if the media had been in use at field
scale for at least 2 years (i.e., about 35,0 0 0 bed volumes at 30 min
EBCT). Other parameters were considered as eligibility criteria, in-
cluding temperature, the biodegradable EfOM fraction (BDOC or
AOC), and biomass quantification, but not used because they were
not frequently reported.
It is common to locate additional (pre)treatment processes be-
tween the WWTP secondary process and the biofilter, and in most
cases results from these studies were included in the analysis.
Examples of these pretreatments include tertiary filtration (rapid
sand or cartridge), coagulation, and ozonation. When significant
pretreatment was reported (e.g., ozonation at high dose and not
immediately preceding biofiltration, ion exchange for DOM re-
moval) those results were excluded.
2.2. Internal WWef treatability study
In addition to the external data, biofiltration results generated
by the authors as part of a larger study to evaluate DBP control
in WWefs by coagulation, ozonation, biofiltration, and GAC adsorp-
tion were included (Summers et al., 2020). One motivation for in-
cluding the data in this review was inert media was used, while
most published WWef studies (88%) used BAC media. The labora-
tory study evaluated six different WWefs for BDOC (Table SI 2.2)
and biofiltration performance with inert anthracite media, specific
ozone doses of 0 and 1.0 O3 /TOC (mg/mg), and EBCTs of 5, 15, and
30 min (Table SI 2.1). The ozonation, biofiltration, and analytical
methods were reported previously (Summers et al., 2020). The TOC
removal data from this study (n = 36) was compared to the liter-
ature data for inert media alone (n = 29) and no evidence was
found to suggest that the laboratory data would introduced bias
in interpreting the literature dataset. A detailed description of this
analysis is in SI Section 3.
2.3. Data pre-processing
The initial biofilter performance dataset contained 286 obser-
vations of EfOM removal by biofiltration across 42 unique WWTP
effluents from 43 studies. Unique WWTPs were identified by name
or by a combination of location and treatment process description.
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers Water Research 199 (2021) 117180

Table 1
Summary of studies which systematically evaluated biofiltration for EfOM removal.

Source Water(s) Scale Ozone/TOC (mg/mg) EBCT (min) Media BAC Throughput, 10 0 0-BVsa TOC Removal Reference

Adelaide, AU Bench, Pilot None 15, 30 BAC, Sand 23 - 30 (onsite) 3–15% Ho et al. (2011)
Albuquerque, USA Pilot 0.5–2.0 20 Anthracite N.A. 6–20% Lee et al. (2012)
Caboolture, AU Pilot, Full None, 0.5 18–120 BAC, Sand 7 - 68 (onsite) 22–63% Reungoat et al. (2011)
Caboolture, AU Pilot, Full None, 0.7 18, 60 BAC, Sand 25 - 67 (onsite) 23–51% Farre et al. (2011)
California, USA (2) Bench None, 0.4–1.0 15–60 BAC 4–5 (onsite) 59–76% Chuang & Mitch (2017)
Dubendorf, CH Pilot None, 0.6 10–18 BAC, Sand 28–37 (onsite & offsite) 13–20% Bourgin et al. (2018)
Golden, USA Pilot None 15–45 BAC 13 (onsite) 65–70% Vatankah et al. (2019)
Istanbul, TU Bench None 9, 18 BAC (2) 22 (onsite) 17–37% Kalkan et al. (2011)
Las Vegas, USA Pilot None, 1.0 2–20 BAC, Anthracite 5+ years (offsite) 9–40% Bacaro et al. (2019)
Las Vegas, USA Pilot 0.7–2.6 2–20 BAC, Anthracite 5+ years (offsite) 6–30% Arnold et al. (2018)
Las Vegas, USA Pilot None, 0.4–1.1 2–15 BAC, Anthracite 5+ years (offsite) 0–29% Gifford et al. (2018)
Reno, USA Pilot 0.7 3–30 BAC 22 - 200 (onsite) 0–33% Gerrity et al., 2011
Windhoek, NM Pilot None, 0.5 7–21 BAC 16–49 (onsite) 4–28% Olivier (2001)
USA (6) Bench None, 1.0 5–30 Anthracite N.A. 1–39% Table SI 2.1

AU: Australia; CH: Switzerland; TU: Turkey; NM: Namibia; USA: United States of America.
a
Throughput achieved prior to being reported as “exhausted” for TOC adsorption.

Some studies evaluated multiple WWTPs and some WWTPs were

evaluated in multiple studies; data were grouped by WWTP rather
than by study to isolate variations in treatability by water qual-
ity rather than research publication. The median number of obser-
vations per WWTP was 3 with a maximum of 86. To avoid over-
leveraging WWTPs with more available data, a preprocessing step
was used to consolidate the data for each WWTP effluent by bin-
ning across similar operating parameters. The following bins were
used: O3 /TOC (mg/mg; 0, >0 to <0.6, 0.6 to <0.9, 0.9 to < 1.2,
>1.2); EBCT (min; 0 to <8, 8 to <16, 16 to <24, 24 to <32, >32);
media type (inert, BAC). For each WWTP effluent bin combination,
the average of each inclusion criteria (i.e., TOC removal, O3 /TOC,
EBCT, and BAC throughput) were retained as single estimators for
that bin. The resulting biofiltration performance dataset, n = 160,
was used for further evaluation. Studies which systematically eval-
uated different operating conditions are summarized in Table 1
and the full dataset is available in Table SI 1.1

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Biofiltration dataset descriptive statistics

The distributions of biofilter influent EfOM TOC concentra-

tions and treatment operating parameters O3 /TOC, EBCT and BAC
throughput in the initial dataset are shown in Fig. 1. We evalu-
ated each distribution and determined that the dataset is a good
representation of typical field-scale conditions as follows. The TOC
median concentration, 7.5 mg/L, and interquartile range (IQR), 6.3
to 9.6 mg/L, are representative of typical WWTP effluents; for ex-
ample, these values are consistent with surveyed WWTPs (n = 38)
that practice nitrification (Krasner et al., 2009). The median spe-
cific ozone dose, 0.8 mg O3 / mg TOC, and IQR (0.6 to 1.0) coincide
with doses typically used to achieve multiple ozonation objectives
in potable reuse, including disinfection and trace organic contam-
inant mitigation while balancing formation of negative byproducts
and cost (Gerrity et al., 2012, 2014; Lee et al., 2013). In 35 cases,
41%, ozone was not utilized (Figure SI 1.1). The median EBCT of
15 min (IQR 10 to 30 min) is consistent to the median EBCT of
18 min in the full-scale facilities (n = 9) in the dataset. For BAC
media, the throughput (in number of bed volumes treated) prior to Fig. 1. Distribution of effluent organic matter levels and biofilter operating param-
sampling had a wide and distributed range, from below 20 0 0 bed eters evaluated in the biofilter performance dataset. Boxplots show the median and
volumes to higher than 10 0,0 0 0. Not shown in Fig. 1 are through- interquartile range with individual data points offset for clarity. For each parameter,
the unique values for each source water in each study are shown once. Data for
put values above 60,0 0 0 bed volumes (n = 16), which represents
no pre-ozonation, EBCT > 70 min, and BAC throughput exceeding 60,0 0 0 BVs are
BAC media from full-scale filters which had been in use for multi- shown in Figure SI 1.1.
ple years (i.e., 2+ years at the median 17 min EBCT). The impact of
residual adsorption at low throughput values was separately eval-
uated (Section 3.3).

3
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers
3.2. Biodegradable EfOM occurrence and removal
Dissolved organic matter, in both WWef and DW source waters,
consists of a range of heterogeneous compounds that have a dis-
tribution of biodegradable behavior. A biodegradable fraction and
a recalcitrant fraction are operationally defined based on labora-
tory tests. The biodegradable fraction represents a continuum with
some compounds being readily consumed - often term rapid, fast,
or easily biodegradable - and others being more recalcitrant, but
ultimately biodegradable, given time and the method of charac-
terization. Two measures of the biodegradable fraction, AOC and
BDOC, commonly applied to natural waters and for treatment and
distribution of conventional drinking water, have also been applied
to WWef (Servais et al., 1987; Khan et al., 1998b; Weinrich et al.,
2009).
3.2.1. Occurrence of biodegradable EfOM without ozone
Secondary treatment (biological) at the WWTP does not achieve
complete BOM removal. In a survey of 21 WWTP effluents, an av-
erage biodegradable EfOM fraction, BDOC/DOC, of 23% and a range
of 4%−41% were reported (Weinrich et al., 2010). A similarly wide
range of results were found across other surveys: range 3%−66%,
n = 17 (Krasner et al., 2009), range 9%−33%, n = 13 (Khan et al.,
1998a), range 23–35%, n = 8 (Babcock et al., 2001) and range
33%−44%, n = 6 from the internal six WWef study (SI Table 2.2.).
The results from these and other studies are summarized in SI Ta-
ble 4.1, and taking all data together results in a median BDOC/DOC
of 26%, interquartile range 18%−34%, and a minimum and maxi-
mum of 3% and 70%, respectively (SI Fig 4.1). Lower effluent BDOC
and TOC have been associated with WWTPs that provide higher
levels of biological treatment, either based on longer solids reten-
tion time (Khan et al., 1998a) or level of nitrification/denitrification
achieved (Krasner et al., 2009). However, in this dataset there is
no significant correlation between effluent TOC and the biodegrad-
able fraction when TOC is above 3 mg/L (p = 0.25, r2 = 0.02, SI
Fig 4.3), which indicates that WWTP effluent TOC concentration
may not be a reliable surrogate for its biodegradability. The type
of WWTP treatment process has also been associated with differ-
ent levels of BDOC, with attached growth processes (i.e., trickling
filters) having higher BDOC/DOC, 35% on average (Weinrich et al.,
2010) and up to 70% (Cha et al., 2004), while MBR effluents com-
monly have low BDOC/DOC, about 10%−15% (Krasner et al., 2009;
Weinrich et al., 2010; Lee et al., 2012)(Figure SI 4.1). However,
the extent to which these differences result from inherent effects
of the treatment processes or other variables has not been well-
defined. Weinrich et al. (2010) in their survey (n = 21) found
a median AOC/BDOC of 50% (IQR 35%−68%), indicating that the
typical biodegradable fraction of WWef is relatively balanced be-
tween readily assimilable compounds and more recalcitrant, but
ultimately biodegradable, constituents.
3.2.2. Occurrence of biodegradable EfOM after ozone
Ozone is widely acknowledged to substantially increase the
biodegradability of DOM, as such biofiltration is often placed
downstream of an ozonation process (Gerrity et al., 2013). Ozone
reacts quickly with unsaturated bonds in DOM, breaking aro-
matic rings and forming oxygenated low molecular weight byprod-
ucts including carboxylic acids, aldehydes, and ketones (von Gun-
ten, 2003). Ozonation byproducts are themselves ozone resistant
and accumulate with increasing ozone dose, thus ozonation largely
transforms, but does not mineralize DOM (von Gunten, 2003). In
the absence of nitrite or other reduced inorganics, ozone decom-
position and exposure is directly controlled by reactions between
ozone and EfOM (Buffle et al., 2006). The specific ozone dose,
4
Water Research 199 (2021) 117180
O3 /TOC (mg/mg, units used throughout), is often used to nor-
malize ozone dose and exposure, reported as the nitrite-adjusted
dose to isolate reactions with organics. Despite variations in EfOM
composition across different wastewater effluents, strong relation-
ships have been reported between O3 /TOC and ozone exposure
(Buffle et al., 2006) and change in UV absorbance (Wert et al.,
2009; Arnold et al., 2018) which support this approach.
Despite wide evaluation of ozone reactivity with dissolved com-
pounds, relatively few studies have quantified the effect of ozone
dose on changes in the biodegradable fraction of EfOM (SI Fig-
ure 4.2). Lee et al. (2012) systematically evaluated the change in
BDOC resulting from specific ozone doses in the 0.3 to 3.0 range
on an MBR effluent (TOC = 3.7 mg/L). Ozonation caused a sub-
stantial increase in BDOC/DOC, from about 14% with no ozonation
up to 45% at O3 /TOC of 1.0 and a maximum of 61% at O3 /TOC
of about 2.0. The change in BDOC was approximately linear in
the O3 /TOC range of 0 to 1 with decreasing BDOC yield at higher
doses. Li et al. (2006) found that an O3 /TOC dose of about 1.0 in-
creased the BDOC/DOC from about 25% to 60% and in the internal
six WWef study it increased from an average of 40% to 62% (n = 6,
Table SI 2.1), while other studies report smaller effects after ozona-
tion at similar doses (Amy et al., 1996; Wang et al., 2008). On an
AOC basis, Wert et al. (2007) observed an increase from 5% to 16%
after ozonation of a WWTP effluent practicing tertiary coagulation,
with the majority of the increase occurring below O3 /TOC of 0.5; in
contrast, Li et al. (2017) reported a higher AOC increase (31%) from
a secondary treated WWTP and with the majority of the increase
occurring above O3 /TOC of 0.4.
Taken together, EfOM ozonation at doses to achieve typical ob-
jectives (O3 /TOC 0.6 to 1.0, described in Section 3.1) can be ex-
pected to yield a substantial BOM fraction, measured either by
BDOC or AOC, across many types of biological processes used at
WWTPs. An O3 /TOC of 1.0 yields a median BDOC/TOC of 59%,
which is 50% higher than without ozone on a paired basis (39%,
n = 10) and more than double when compared to the dataset as a
whole, i.e., on an unpaired basis (26%, n = 61). However, the small
BDOC dataset for ozonated EfOM (n = 14) indicates that research
is needed to better understand the dose-response relationship be-
tween ozone and formation of BDOC and AOC in wastewater efflu-
ents. Understanding the total biodegradable fraction, and develop-
ment of more precise estimates of the biodegradable continuum, is
needed to properly evaluate biofilter performance and to account
for the possibility of biofilm growth downstream in distribution
systems or building premise plumbing as potable reuse becomes
more widely adopted.
3.2.3. Removal of biodegradable EfOM during biofiltration
Incomplete BOM removal is observed during biofiltration un-
der normal EBCTs (<60 min). BDOC removals of 30% (Lee et al.,
2012), 60% (Li et al., 2006), and 75% (Kalkan et al., 2011) have
been reported from EfOM. In the internal six WWef study, the av-
erage BDOC removal across the six wastewater effluents ranged
from 10% (no ozone, 5 min EBCT) to 50% (O3 /TOC 1.0, 30 min
EBCT). This range of BDOC removal is similar to that seen during
biofiltration of conventional drinking waters, 25–80% (Juhna and
Melin, 2006). Similarly, Terry and Summers (2018) in their meta-
analysis of drinking water biofilter performance found that median
TOC removal was about 50% of median BDOC for both ozonated
and non-ozonated waters. Given that only 8% of the literature
treatment data found was expressed as BDOC or AOC, the results
herein will be expressed on a TOC basis.
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers Water Research 199 (2021) 117180

Fig. 2. Effect of influent TOC and throughput on BAC biofilter steady-state performance. a) Filter run time required to reach steady state (i.e., fully biological mode) can vary
substantially based on influent TOC. A power relationship for n = 52 breakthrough curves demonstrates that progressively higher throughput is required to reach steady
state when influent TOC is lower (i.e., better pretreatment). b) The highest TOC removal in BAC biofilters was achieved only when media had low throughput. Data were
re-classified as “GAC” when steady state may not have been achieved (BVs treated were less than 20,0 0 0 and below the power relationship in Fig. 2a). c) TOC removal
was higher in “GAC” filters than in “BAC” filters (t-test, p < 0.001). Only data for “BAC” filters, which exhibit the characteristics of long-term performance, were retained in
subsequent biofilter analysis. Note: data shown for EBCT ≤ 60 min.

3.3. Determination of steady-state BAC biofilter performance
The use of GAC in biofilters has many benefits which include
residual adsorption capacity for strongly adsorbing compounds
and the ability to attenuate influent spikes of adsorbing com-
pounds. The transition of fresh GAC into biological activated car-
bon (BAC) consists of decreasing adsorptive removal that over-
laps with the establishment of bio-removal, which makes charac-
terization of biological performance difficult (Fig. 2 in Terry and
Summers, 2018). The adsorption capacity utilization phase can
last for several months and longer depending on filter size and
the physiochemical properties of both the adsorbent and adsor-
bate; for example, slow adsorption of large molecular weight DOM
into GAC micropores can take months (Peel and Benedek, 1983;
Summers and Roberts, 1987; Sontheimer et al., 1988) and more
strongly adsorbing compounds can take months to years to de-
plete the adsorption capacity (Kennedy et al., 2015). This over-
laps with the bioacclimation phase, both in the establishment of
the type and concentration of biomass needed to metabolize BOM
which takes a few weeks to a few months (Wang et al., 1995;
Greenstein et al., 2018; Sundaram et al., 2020) and in the adap-
tation of the biomass to degrade more recalcitrant compounds
which can take longer (Zearley and Summers, 2012). . The tran-
sition to steady state bioremoval is asymptotic and dependent on
water quality factors, such as temperature and BOM characteris-
tics. To best characterize long-term BAC performance the unsteady-
state contribution of adsorption should be minimized. If the BAC
filter is not operated for enough time, an over-estimate of the
long-term BOM removal will be made. As such, an estimate of the
time or throughput needed to allow adsorption to become a small
part of the overall BOM removal is needed. Zachman and Sum-
mers (2010) have systematically shown that adsorption capacity is
higher for low DOM concentration and pH, smaller GAC size and
longer EBCT. In particular, the run time (throughput) to a target ef-
fluent concentration is inversely proportional to the DOM influent
concentration.

5
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers
We hypothesized that high TOC removal observed in some
studies with BAC media might be explained in part by residual
adsorption rather than biofiltration alone, overstating steady-state
biofilter performance. A literature review of full- or pilot-scale GAC
application to WWEfs was conducted and the transition from GAC
adsorption to “steady state” (SS) TOC bioremoval, i.e., BAC, as a
function of influent TOC concentration was assessed for 26 GAC
runs (Fig. 2a, summarized in Table SI 5.1). Other parameters known
to impact steady state throughput, e.g., temperature, pH and GAC
type and size, were not reported with enough frequency to quan-
tify their impact. The average steady state removal after GAC tran-
sition to BAC was 25% ± 8%. It is often difficult to establish the
point at which “steady state” removal is achieved. When sufficient
data were available a slope of 0.3% change / 10 0 0 bed volumes was
used as the steady state removal criterion. However, most stud-
ies were plagued by insufficient data at long run times and varia-
tions in the influent concentration or upstream operating condi-
tions. The relationship between influent TOC and throughput to
80% breakthrough from the meta-analysis of 26 GAC runs reported
by Benstoem et al. (2017) is also shown in Fig. 2a. Again, other
parameters known to impact GAC performance were not reported.
Throughput data from both the field studies evaluated at steady
state (average 25% removal) and Benstoem et al. (2017) study at
80% breakthrough (20% removal) were combined and the overall
regression for these 52 data points is also shown in Fig. 2a. While
influent pH, EBCT and GAC type and size are not modeled by this
relationship, it can serve as a guide for estimating the run length
of a GAC adsorber with coal based GAC (bituminous or lignite) to
the point at which adsorption is not a major factor in TOC re-
moval. The relationship can be further estimated by the product
of 90,0 0 0 to the inverse of the influent TOC. For lower pH (<7.5),
longer EBCTs (>15 min) and smaller GAC particle size (12 × 40
sieve), longer run times would be expected before adsorptive TOC
removal is negligible. Thus, new pilot studies that are only inter-
ested in long-term bioremoval assessment and not evaluating GAC
to BAC transition should consider using GAC from other sites with
similar water quality. This media should be re-acclimated to the
new source water until a steady state removal is established.
The effect of throughput on bulk organic matter removal (as
TOC) for adsorptive media in the biofiltration performance dataset
(n = 89) is shown in Fig. 2b using a bin width of 10,0 0 0 bed
volumes. Only steady state operation data, either as defined by
the authors of these studies or as determined in this review by
analysis of the endpoints of the TOC breakthrough curves when
available, are shown in Fig. 2b. Under steady state conditions
average TOC removal is independent of throughput, however in
the dataset the median TOC removal for biofilters with less than
10,0 0 0 bed volumes treated was nearly four-fold higher than for
those with greater than 40,0 0 0 bed volumes treated, 70% and
18%, respectively. Compared to 40,0 0 0+ bed volumes, TOC removal
was higher for 0–10,0 0 0 (p < 0.001) and 10,0 0 0–20,0 0 0 bed vol-
umes (p < 0.001) but was not significantly different for bins above
20,0 0 0 bed volumes (p ≥ 0.3) (ANOVA and Tukey’s HSD).
Additionally, the relative throughput, defined as the ratio of
throughput achieved to predicted throughput required for reach-
ing steady state (Fig. 2a) was calculated for the dataset. A relative
throughput of 1.0 or greater indicates that sufficient bed volumes
were treated to reach steady state based on influent TOC, assum-
ing the organic matter exhibits average treatability. For through-
put below 20,0 0 0 bed volumes, median TOC removal when rela-
tive throughput was 1.0 or above (26%) was lower than for relative
throughput below 1.0 (68%), while for throughput above 20,0 0 0
bed volumes median TOC removal (20%) was independent of rel-
ative throughput (Figure SI 5.1). In combination, higher TOC re-
moval was associated with adsorptive media biofilters which were
evaluated at low throughput (less than 20,0 0 0 bed volumes) and
6
Water Research 199 (2021) 117180
for which influent TOC was low (relative throughput less than 1),
indicating non-steady-state behavior even when all biofilters were
reported to be operating at steady state.
To account for the significant effect of throughput on TOC re-
moval in this meta-analysis, data for adsorptive media filters were
re-classified as “BAC” when throughput exceeded 20,0 0 0 bed vol-
umes or when relative throughput was 1.0 or higher and as “GAC”
when neither threshold was achieved. Of 89 data points, 40 were
classified as “GAC”, indicating that a large portion of the dataset
represents biofilters for which adsorptive processes could be ex-
pected (Fig. 2c). TOC removal with “GAC” media was 29% percent-
age points higher on average compared to “BAC” media, even when
accounting for effects of EBCT and O3 /TOC (ANCOVA, p < 0.001). As
a result, data for “GAC” media are excluded from further discussion
and the meta-analysis.
3.4. Effects of biofilter operating parameters on WWef TOC removal
The effects of ozone, EBCT and media type, on TOC removal are
shown in Fig. 3, using bins to illustrate the dataset as a whole (i.e.,
on an unpaired basis). For each bin no systematic differences in the
prevalence of the other parameters were found, thus the effects
of ozone, EBCT, media type, and water temperature are reviewed
individually in this section. Analysis of the operating parameters all
together, with ozone dose and EBCT taken as continuous variables,
will follow in Section 3.5.
3.4.1. Ozone and ozone dose
For the dataset as a whole, biofiltration without pre-ozonation
(n = 44) yielded a median TOC removal of 13% (Fig. 3) and with
pre-ozonation, which increases the BOM fraction, the TOC removal
increased to 21% (n = 73). Higher TOC removal after pre-ozonation
is also reported in studies with paired data, and the magnitude of
the difference is often higher than indicated in the whole dataset.
These paired data cover a wide range of WWTPs and biofilter op-
erating parameters, summarized in Table SI 6.2. Most commonly,
TOC removal was 10–20 percentage points (p.p.) higher for biofil-
ters after ozonation (O3 /TOC 0.5–1.1) compared to no ozonation
(Olivier, 2001; Farré et al., 2011; Gifford et al., 2018), and the inter-
nal six WWef study yielded 7–18 p.p. higher removal after ozona-
tion at O3 /TOC 1.0 (Table SI 2.1). The difference in TOC removal
ranged from as high as 30 p.p. (Bacaro et al., 2019) to as low as 4
p.p. (Bourgin et al., 2018).
The impact of different ozone doses, however, is more var-
ied. Gifford et al. (2018) fit linear relationships between ozone
dose and TOC removal across O3 /TOC of 0.3–1.2 for BAC and an-
thracite media on an MBR effluent. The fitted slopes were 1.2–1.4
p.p. higher TOC removal per 0.1 O3 /TOC dose increase, indicating
that large changes in O3 /TOC were required to achieve substantially
higher TOC removal. Similarly, Lee et al. (2012) observed a 9 p.p.
increase in TOC removal when O3 /TOC was increased from 0.5 to
1.0, though the TOC removal was much smaller than the increase
in O3 -derived BDOC (i.e., BDOC/TOC of 54%, compared to 14% with-
out ozone) which may be the result of media type (anthracite) or
EBCT (20 min). Applying even higher ozone doses (O3 /TOC ≥2.0
vs ≤1.0) can further improve TOC removal, by about 5–10 p.p.,
but the marginal benefit is lower (Lee et al., 2012; Arnold et al.,
2018). In contrast, some studies report no substantial increase
in TOC removal with increasing ozone dose across O3 /TOC 0.35–
1 (Chuang and Mitch, 2017) or 1.0–2.0 (Sundaram et al., 2020).
Zhu et al. (2015) reported small incremental improvements in DOM
removal on a COD basis across O3 /TOC 0.6 to 1.2; although re-
moval reached about 10 p.p. higher on average at these endpoints,
the difference in means was smaller than the standard devia-
tions. Overall, pre-ozonation improves biofilter performance, but
only modest gains can be expected at incrementally higher ozone
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers
Fig. 3. Distributions of TOC removal across biofilter operating parameters. Bins correspond to the pre-processing method (i.e., each source water is shown a maximum of
once per bin). Each data point is shown once per panel (n = 118).
doses (e.g., from 0.8 to 1.0). Bigger performance gains are expected
with much larger ozone doses but, because of higher cost and chal-
lenges with bromate formation, ozone dose will likely be deter-
mined by other treatment objectives in a potable reuse scenario
such as disinfection.
3.4.2. Empty bed contact time
Longer EBCTs can increase DOM removal as more exposure to
biomass is provided (Wang et al., 1995). For the whole dataset, in-
creasing the EBCT from below 8 min (n = 28) to 8 to <16 min
(n = 44) increased the median TOC removal from 10% to 17%
(Fig. 3). Incremental DOM removal decreases at longer EBCTs as
the more easily biodegradable substrate is preferentially removed
in the upper filter leaving only more recalcitrant compounds in the
lower filter (Zearley and Summers, 2012). In drinking water treat-
ment TOC removal typically begins to plateau at EBCTs in the range
of 5 to 15 min (Terry and Summers, 2018), however as shown in
Fig. 3 no plateau in median EfOM removal is evident up through
30 min EBCT. This is consistent with higher overall BDOC in WWefs
compared to typical drinking waters (Section 3.1) and suggests that
a substantial portion of the BDOC is relatively recalcitrant, requir-
ing longer EBCTs for removal. Biofilters treating WWef typically
have utilized longer EBCTs, median 18 min in the nine full scale
facilities in the dataset, than those utilized in conventional drink-
ing water biofilters, median 7 min (Brown et al., 2016).
In the most extensively investigated source water with paired
data, an MBR pilot plant using both anthracite and 5+ year old
BAC, maximum TOC removal was typically achieved at or below
10 min EBCT (Gifford et al., 2018; Bacaro et al., 2019). The excep-
tion was after high ozone dose (O3 /TOC 2.3), where TOC removal
increased by 6 p.p. when EBCT was increased from 10 min to
20 min (Arnold et al., 2018). In contrast, in the internal six WWef
study using anthracite media across six non-MBR WWTPs, higher
TOC removal was consistently observed with increasing EBCT in
each water, both from EBCT 5 to 15 min and from 15 to 30 min,
and both with and without ozone (Table SI 2.1). In these waters,
increasing EBCT from 5 to 15 min after pre-ozonation improved
TOC removal by an average of 10 p.p., and increasing EBCT to
30 min improved TOC removal by an additional 10 p.p.
Other studies which evaluated the effect of EBCT have used BAC
media which started as fresh GAC (Table SI 6.3). In these studies,
extending EBCT to longer than 20 min improved TOC removal by
up to 8 p.p. (Olivier, 2001), 12 p.p. (Gerrity et al., 2011), and 23
p.p. (Farré et al., 2011), compared to performance below 20 min.
Kalkan et al. (2011) investigated two types of BAC media in paral-
lel and reported a similar increase in TOC removal for a thermally-
activated carbon (7 p.p., EBCT 9 to 18 min) but no increase in TOC
7
Water Research 199 (2021) 117180
removal for a chemically-activated carbon. A challenge with inter-
preting BAC results, even with paired data, is that each EBCT has
achieved a different throughput, therefore the role of EBCT can
be confounded with the role of residual adsorption. As an exam-
ple, a GAC to BAC filter operated for 9 months will have treated
about 80,0 0 0 BVs at 5 min EBCT but just 13,0 0 0 BVs at 30 min;
it could be expected that the biomass profile throughout the fil-
ter has reached steady state and that minimal adsorption capacity
remains in the upper filter, but the lower filter remains squarely
in the adsorption mass transfer zone. While the above-referenced
studies were screened for BAC throughput to minimize adsorptive
confounding (Section 3.3) it is not possible to isolate biological
processes within the data itself. The study by Vaidya et al. (2019),
however, reported 21% TOC removal in a BAC biofilter (5 min EBCT)
and an additional 20% TOC removal in a GAC adsorber (10 min
EBCT) which was operated to 40,0 0 0 bed volumes and exhibited
pseudo-steady-state behavior. This indicates that EBCT played a
major role in the 16 p.p. increase in TOC removal at the total
15 min EBCT compared to 5 min for BAC media.
Both the dataset as a whole and the paired-data studies show
that EBCTs above 8 min normally provide meaningfully higher TOC
removal than lower EBCTs. In many cases, extending EBCT above
20 or 30 min can also have a significant benefit. This supports the
current practice of using longer EBCTs than in conventional drink-
ing water treatment and indicates that even longer EBCTs could be
useful. In practice, designers and operators must balance the in-
creased cost and operational complexity of longer EBCTs with po-
tential negative impacts of a residual biodegradable EfOM being
released to the subsurface or distribution system in potable reuse
scenarios.
3.4.3. Media type
As stated in Section 3.3, GAC is often used for biofilter media as
it offers several advantages over inert media including better TOC
removal. However, the performance of biofilters that use GAC as
media can be substantially higher due to residual TOC adsorption
capacity when prior throughput and influent TOC are low. The BAC
data in Fig. 3 does not include that from biofilters with GAC that
did not meet the minimum throughput criteria (20,0 0 0+ BV) and
the TOC removal with BAC media was still higher than inert me-
dia on average by 7 percentage points, 15% vs 23%. Similarly, paired
studies that evaluated both inert and BAC media (also 20,0 0 0+ BV)
under the same feed water and operational conditions (i.e., ozone
dose and EBCT) almost always report higher TOC removal with
BAC media than inert media (SI Table 6.1). The largest differences
in TOC removal were in the range of 21–27 percentage points
higher in BAC filters in two studies that use long EBCTs, 60 min
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers
Table 2
Standardized linear regression coefficients by operating parameter.
Coefficient (β ) β Standard Error
Intercept 13.2% 0.7%
Media Type (BAC) 8.7% 1.1%
O3 /TOC 5.3% 0.6%
EBCT 3.9% 0.6%
(EBCT)∗ (O3 /TOC) 1.4% 0.5%
and 40 min, respectively (Farré et al., 2011; Reaume et al., 2015).
Smaller increases in BOM removal with BAC were reported in the
other studies. Ho et al. (2011) observed 10–12 p.p. higher TOC re-
moval in BAC under non-ozonated conditions, with the difference
driven by very low TOC removal in the inert media columns, 3–
5%. In several studies with MBR pilot plant effluent the TOC re-
moval ranged from 6 to 40% and the BAC filter consistently out-
performed the parallel anthracite filter by 1–12 p.p. (median 5.5
p.p.) (Arnold et al., 2018; Gifford et al., 2018; Bacaro et al., 2019).
Hooper et al. (2020) found a 7 percentage point effect for BAC
compared to anthracite at low temperatures, 12–15 o C, despite a
shorter EBCT (7.5 min vs 12 min). In contrast, Zhu et al. (2015) re-
ported no significant difference between anthracite and BAC on a
COD basis and (Bourgin et al., 2018) observed slightly higher TOC
removal in a full scale sand filter compared to a pilot scale BAC
filter (20% vs 18%) and despite the BAC filter having a longer EBCT
(18 min vs 10 min).
In these paired studies, the advantage of BAC over inert me-
dia biofilters was greatest for systems that started with onsite GAC
and ran the filters long enough, 20,0 0 0+ BV, to yield BAC, com-
pared to studies that sampled used GAC from an offsite full-scale
facility or previous studies. In the latter case, in which the risk
of residual non-steady-state adsorption is less likely, performance
with BAC media ranged from about 10 percentage points better to
no substantial effect. In total, there is strong evidence that BAC me-
dia can be expected to outperform inert media, even when con-
trolling for residual non-steady-state adsorptive capacity, however
very large differences may indicate non-steady state behavior in
the BAC which should be closely evaluated.
3.4.4. Temperature
Water temperature affects microbial activity and can signifi-
cantly affect the kinetics of BOM removal in biofilters. For exam-
ple, in drinking water treatment achieving 50% BDOC removal re-
quires a 14 min EBCT on average for temperatures below 10 o C,
while only 4 min EBCT is required for temperatures above 20 o C
(Terry and Summers, 2018). The effects of temperature on kinet-
ics of EfOM removal, however, have been largely neglected. In the
dataset, only 17 of 43 studies reported water temperature data dur-
ing their evaluation of biofiltration. Thirteen of these studies eval-
uated a single temperature, each within the narrow range of 22–25
o C, and the others reported a wider temperature range (e.g., 13–28
o C) across their testing, but did not isolate the role of temperature
on biofilter performance. Thus, the impact of temperature on EfOM
removal, specifically any important deviations from that seen dur-
ing conventional drinking water biofiltration, remains unknown.
3.5. Regression evaluation of biofiltration performance
The combined impacts of ozone dose, EBCT, and media type on
biofilter performance were evaluated with a linear regression. This
descriptive model approach was used in order to estimate the rel-
ative contributions of each operating parameter on observed EfOM
removal and to identify the variance associated with these con-
trollable factors. The model space was defined as EBCT 5–30 min,
O3 /TOC 0-1.2, and TOC removal ≥ 0% which encapsulates the ma-
8
Water Research 199 (2021) 117180
Mean (μ) Standard Deviation (σ 2 ) p
– – <0.001
– – <0.001
0.48 0.44 <0.001
14.4 min 8.5 min <0.001
– – 0.011
jority of the dataset (n = 98 out of 118). Data outside the model
space, plus one high-leverage value, were removed as outliers.
The regression model results are shown in Table 2 with simu-
lated TOC removal represented by the standardized regression co-
efficient (β ), and visualized in Fig. 4a with isoremoval lines as a
function of O3 /TOC and EBCT for each media type. The regression
intercept represents the simulated TOC removal when all parame-
ters are at the dataset average (μ) and remaining coefficients rep-
resent the change in simulated TOC removal when the operating
parameter is changed by one standard deviation (σ 2 ). The TOC
removal simulation range (5–32%) matches the observed 5th and
95th percentiles in the dataset (3–31%) and each main effect cor-
related strongly with TOC removal (p < 0.001). TOC removal with
BAC media was substantially higher than for inert media, 8.7 per-
centage points on average after controlling for adsorption, which
supports the use of BAC media in reuse biofilters. Ozone dose af-
fected TOC removal by 1.2 p.p. per 0.1 change in specific dose,
similar to that found by Gifford et al. (2018) for one feed wa-
ter (avg 1.3 p.p. per 0.1 change in specific dose). For both ozone
dose and EBCT (i.e., 1 p.p. per 2.2 min change in EBCT) relatively
large operational changes are required to expect meaningful im-
pact on TOC removal. Additionally, strong evidence was found of a
positive interactive effect between EBCT and O3 /TOC (p = 0.011);
this suggests that longer EBCT may be more effective when more
BOM is formed at higher ozone doses, however the actual effect
size (β = 1.4%) was relatively small. Such an interactive effect was
observed experimentally by Gifford et al. (2018) where increasing
ozone dose also required a longer EBCT to maximize TOC removal.
Weaker evidence was found for a positive interactive effect be-
tween BAC media and longer EBCT (β = 2.0%, p = 0.18). Applying
these interactive effects is difficult because relatively few data ex-
ist for high O3 /TOC or for BAC media with high EBCT; this analysis
suggests that future research in these areas is warranted.
The meta-analysis multiple linear regression was statistically
significant (p < 2E-16) and provides good correlation (adj-
r2 = 0.64) considering the scope and context of this analy-
sis, i.e., evaluating three operational parameters for total (not
biodegradable) organic carbon removal across a diverse range of
studies. Incorporating more precise water quality parameters and
standardization of biofiltration methods (e.g., ensuring scalability
(McKie et al., 2019; Terry et al., 2019)) may help explain the re-
maining variance. The regression presented here was judged to
be an appropriate representation of the dataset based on residu-
als analysis (Figure SI 7.1), and though transformed and non-linear
model forms were also considered, none presented a better fit to
the data. Future research is needed to more completely describe
biofilter performance at higher ozone doses and EBCTs, and the
least-squares average TOC removal presented here should not be
extrapolated beyond the model space.
The distribution of the regression model residuals gives insight
into expected performance variations that can benchmark future
research and implementation of reuse biofilters (Fig. 4b). The resid-
uals interquartile range was ± 3.5 percentage points, (i.e., half of
the data was within this range) indicating that operational param-
eters alone yield a suitably precise treatability estimate on average
to be useful for preliminary design and for designing bench and
pilot scale studies for many WWTP effluents. Further, the stan-
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers Water Research 199 (2021) 117180

Fig. 4. Expected TOC removal (%) as a function of ozone dose, EBCT and media type evaluated from linear regression. a) Isoremoval lines show simulated TOC removal. b)
Observed vs simulated TOC removal shown with residuals interquartile range (dashed lines) and residual standard error (dotted lines). Simulated TOC removal was accurate
for both laboratory and field scale data.

dard deviation of the residuals (5.6 percentage points) indicates
the likelihood of biofilter performance which diverges from the
average. For example, TOC removal outside of ± 11 p.p. (2 stan-
dard deviations) of the regression relationship is statistically un-
likely given the current dataset, and observations of such outlier
data should be closely studied as fundamental insights into good
(or bad) biofilter performance could provide a large step forward
for the field.
4. Conclusions, recommendations, and areas for future
research
• A meta-analysis was used to evaluate the effects of the opera-
tion parameters, ozone dose, EBCT, and media type, on effluent
organic matter removal by biofiltration. Each operating param-
eter had a significant impact on observed TOC removal, which
were quantified with a regression model.

9
E.S. Peterson and R.S. Summers
• Performance of BAC media can be significantly influenced by
run time (throughput) prior to data collection, and the com-
bination of slow adsorption and biodegradation combined with
normal influent water quality perturbations makes it difficult to
ascertain steady-state behavior during transition from “GAC ad-
sorber” to “BAC biofilter”. A minimum of 20,0 0 0 bed volumes
of throughput prior to evaluating biofiltration is recommended
when using BAC media, and even higher throughput may be re-
quired if influent TOC is below about 5 mg/L.
• Relatively few studies have evaluated the impact of ozone on
the biodegradable EfOM fraction. An O3 /TOC of 1.0 yields a me-
dian BDOC/TOC of 59%, which is more than 50% higher than
without ozone on an unpaired basis (26%, n = 61) and very
few studies reported filter biomass. Improved knowledge of as-
similable and total biodegradable EfOM and filter biomass can
be used to generate more precise estimates of biofilter perfor-
mance.
• The effects of WWTP treatment level upstream of biofiltration,
seasonality, and temperature for EfOM removal remain to be
understood.
• Meta-analysis indicates that higher ozone doses and EBCTs can
provide meaningful gains in TOC removal, however data at high
operating levels is relatively scarce. Future studies should in-
vestigate these levels in more depth to more precisely deter-
mine where diminishing returns in TOC removal occur across
many different source waters. Since high EBCTs and high ozone
doses are costly, improved understanding of possible benefits is
needed to properly support design decision making.
• Sequential use of biofilters followed by GAC adsorbers could
provide de facto extended biofilter EBCT, as the GAC adsorbers
acclimate to the BOM and transition from GAC to BAC. This
could be especially effective when the GAC adsorber is operated
in parallel blended effluent mode, which could prolong the run
life of GAC adsorbers.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to
influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgments
The first author was funded by a Dean’s Fellowship, Department
of Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering, University of
Colorado Boulder. The authors acknowledge Sierra Johnson, Steven
Shiokari, Hannah Peterson, and Professor Julie Korak for their as-
sistance in data collection and analysis.
Supplementary materials
Supplementary material associated with this article can be
found, in the online version, at doi:10.1016/j.watres.2021.117180.
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