WASTEWATER

TREATMENT
Introduction
Wastewater characteristics
• The municipal wastewater, also called sewage coming into a
sanitary sewerage system consist of:
• Domestic wastewater(sewage)
• Industrial wastewater
• Inflow, and
• Infiltration

• The last two increases the total wastewater volume, but are
generally not important in wastewater disposal
Industrial Wastewater
• The important point to remember is that :
• Industrial wastewater vary widely with the size and type of
industry, and the amount of treatment applied before discharge
(disposal) into sewers

• BOD is reduced and suspended solids (SS) are removed by

wastewater treatment, however,

• Industrial wastewaters containing heavy metals, motor oil,

refractory organic compounds (Phenol and Agri. based
pesticides), radioactive materials, and similar exotic
pollutants requires pretreatment
Characteristics of typical domestic wastewater
Table below shows typical values for the most important
parameters of domestic wastewater
Typical value for
Parameters
Domestic Sewage
BOD 250 mg/L
Suspended Solids (SS) 220 mg/L
Phosphorus 8 mg/L
Organic or ammonia nitrogen 40 mg/L
pH 6-8
Chemical oxygen demand 500 mg/L
Total solids 270 mg/L
Table 1. Characteristics of typical domestic wastewater
Objective of Wastewater Treatment
• The overall objective of wastewater treatment is:
• To reduce the concentrations of specific pollutants in the
wastewater to a level at which the discharge of the effluent
from the treatment plant will not adversely affect the
environment or pose a health threat
Degree and type of wastewater treatment
• Technically, water can be completely purified by distillation
and deionization, however,

• Besides being very expensive, it can be very detrimental to

fish and other organisms in the receiving water bodies

• The degree of treatment depends on the assimilative

capacity of the receiving water
• DO sag curves can tell how much BOD must be removed
from wastewater so that the DO of the receiving water is not
depressed too far

• The amount of BOD that must be removed is an effluent

standard and tells the type of wastewater treatment
required

• It is desirable that the effluent from wastewater treatment

must meet the following effluent standards:
DO Sag
Curve
Degree and type of wastewater treatment (Contd-)
Parameter Effluents
BOD ≤ 15 mg/L

SS ≤ 15 mg/L

Phosphorus ≤ 1 mg/L

• Additional effluent standards could be added to the above

list but for illustrative purposes we consider only these three
Wastewater treatment Systems
• Here are the various treatment systems to achieve the above
effluent standards:
• Primary treatment: physical processes that remove
nonhomogenizable solids and homogenize the remaining effluent
• Secondary treatment: Chemical or biological processes that
remove most of the biochemical demand for oxygen
• Tertiary treatment: physical, biological and chemical processes to
remove nutrients like phosphorus and inorganic pollutants, to
deodorize and decolorize effluent water, and to carry out further
oxidation
 PRIMARY
TREATMENT
PRIMARY TREATMENT
• The most objectionable aspect of discharging raw sewage
into watercourses is the floating material
• Thus, screens are used as the first step in treatment plants
1. Screens
Typical screens as shown in the following figure consists of a
series of steel bars that might be 2.5 cm apart
Bar screens used in wastewater treatment
• A screen in a modern treatment plant removes material
that might damage equipment or hinder further treatment
• In some older treatment plants, screens are cleaned by
hand, but mechanical cleaning equipment is used in almost
all new plants
• The cleaning rakes are activated when screens gets
sufficiently clogged to raise the water level in front of the
bars
2. Comminutor
• In many plants the second treatment step is a comminutor, a
circular grinder designed to grind the solids coming through
the screen into pieces about 0.3 cm or less in diameter
• A typical comminutor design is shown below
3. Grit Chamber
• The third treatment step is the removal of grit or sand
from the wastewater
• Grit and sand can damage equipment like pumps and flow
meters and must be removed
• The most common grit chamber is a wide space in the
channel where the flow is slowed enough to allow the
dense grit to settle out
• Sand is 2.5 times denser than most organic solids and thus
settles much faster
Grit Chamber (Contd-)
• The objective of a
grit chamber is to
remove sand and grit
without removing
organic material

• This separated sand

may be used as fill
without additional
treatment
4. Settling Tank
• The settling tank is provided immediately after grit chambers
to remove as much solid material as possible
• Accordingly, the retention time is long, and the turbulence is
kept to a minimum
• The solids settle out to the bottom of the tank and are
removed through a pipe, while the clarified liquid escapes
over the V – notch weir that distributes the liquid discharge
equally all the way around the tank
Figures of settling
tanks
SETTLING TANK – SHOWING SLUDGE SCRAPPER (CIRCULAR)
V-notch
Settling Tank
• Settling tanks are also called sedimentation tanks or clarifiers
• The settling tank that immediately follows screening and grit
removal is called the primary clarifier
• The solids that drop to the bottom of a primary clarifier are
removed as raw sludge
5. Raw sludge
• Raw sludge generally has three characteristics that makes its
disposal difficult:
✓A powerfully unpleasant odor,
✓Is full of pathogenic organisms, and
✓Is wet
• Therefore, it must be stabilized to slow down its further
decomposition and dewatered for ease of disposal
Objective of Primary treatment
• The objective of primary treatment is the removal of solids,
although some BOD is removed because of the removal of
decomposable solids
Outcome of Primary treatment
• After undergoing the primary treatment, the wastewater
might now have the following characteristics
Pollutants Raw Wastewater After Primary treatment

BOD5, mg/L 250 175

SS, mg/L 220 60

P, mg/L 8 7

• After primary treatment, the wastewater may move on to

secondary treatment
SECONDARY
WASTEWATER
TREATMENT
Secondary Treatment
• The objective of primary treatment is to remove solids,
whereas the objective of secondary treatment is to remove
BOD

• The demand for oxygen must be reduced (energy wasted) or

else the discharge may create unacceptable conditions in the
receiving waters

• In secondary treatment, we will focus on Activated Sludge

System
Activated Sludge System
• An activated sludge system, includes a tank full of waste
liquid from the primary clarifier and a mass of
microorganisms

• Air bubbled into this aeration tank provides the necessary

oxygen for the survival of the aerobic organisms

• The microorganism meet dissolved organic matter in the

wastewater
• It then adsorb the organic material, and ultimately decompose
the material to CO2, H2O, some stable compounds, and more
microorganisms

• When most of the organic material, that is, food for the
microorganisms, has been used up, the microorganisms are
separated from the liquid in another settling tank, sometimes
called a secondary or final clarifier

• The microorganisms remaining in the settling tank have no

food available, become hungry, and are thus activated – hence
the term activated sludge
• The clarified liquid escapes over a weir and may be
discharged into the receiving water

• The settled microorganisms are pumped back to the head of

the aeration tank and are now called return activated
sludge

• The microorganisms again find more food in the organic

compounds in the liquid entering the aeration tank from the
primary clarifier, and the process starts over again

• Activated sludge treatment is a continuous process, with

continuous sludge pumping and clean water discharge
Problems of Activated Sludge System
• Activated sludge treatment produces more microorganisms
than necessary and if the microorganisms are not removed,
their concentration will soon increase and clog the system
with solids

• Some of the microorganisms must therefore be wasted and

the disposal of such waste activated sludge is one of the
most difficult aspects of wastewater treatment
Effluents leaving the Secondary Treatment Plant
• Effluent from the secondary treatment plant has approximately
met its previously established standards for BOD and SS

• Only Phosphorous content remains high

• The removal of inorganic compounds, including inorganic

phosphorous and nitrogen compounds, requires advanced or
tertiary wastewater treatment
Typical wastewater characteristics after
secondary treatment
The wastewater leaving the secondary treatment has the following
approximate water quality:

Raw After Primary After Secondary

Wastewater treatment Treatment
BOD, 250 175 15
mg/L
SS, mg/L 220 60 15
P, mg/L 8 7 6
 TERTIARY
OR
ADVANCED
TREATMENT
Introduction
• Primary and secondary treatment has removed a major junk
of SS and BOD from wastewaters

• However, the effluent leaving the secondary treatment plant

is still significantly polluted

• The effluent from secondary treatment contains:

SS
BOD
Nutrients and other toxic compounds
BOD Removal
• An advanced treatment for BOD removal is the polishing
pond, or oxidation pond
• Polishing ponds are large lagoons into which the
wastewater from secondary treatment flows
Characteristics of Polishing Ponds
• Such ponds have a long retention time, often measured in
weeks
• Oxidation ponds are aerobic in nature and has large
surface area for light penetration
• Light penetration is important for algal growth
Polishing OR Oxidation Ponds (Contd-)

• When the rate of oxidation in a pond is too great and oxygen

availability becomes limiting, the ponds may be forcibly
aerated by either diffusive or mechanical aeration
• Such ponds are also called aerated lagoons and are widely
used in treating industrial effluent (see following slide)
• An oxidation pond and the reactions that take place in it are
shown in figure after aerated lagoons
Mechanical
Aerators

Diffusive
Aerators
An Oxidation Pond
Removal of Nutrients
• Nitrogen and phosphorous are essential nutrients for aquatic
plant growth
• When available in excess in water body, the water body can
become “eutrophic” – literally “well fed”
• Algae can be represented as C106H263O110N16P1
• Algal growth requires C : N : P
106 : 16 : 1 in moles
~ 40 : 7 : 1 in weight
Removal of Nutrients
• Liebig’s law of the minimum states that growth will be limited
by the nutrient that is least available relative to the
organism’s need
• P is usually limiting in fresh water
• N is usually limiting in estuaries and coastal waters
• In water bodies where eutrophication is a problem, the
nutrient load from wastewater must be controlled
Removal of Nutrients
Nitrogen Removal
• In wastewaters, most of the nitrogen exists as ammonia.
Nitrogen compounds may be removed from wastewaters in
two ways:
• Firstly, increasing the pH produces the reaction

• Much of the dissolved ammonia gas may then be expelled

from the water into the atmosphere
Nitrogen Removal
• Secondly, the ammonium ion in the wastewater may also
be oxidized completely by bacteria like Nitrobacter and
Nitrosomonas, in a process called nitrification

• These reactions are slow and requires long retention times

in the aeration tank as well as sufficient DO
Nitrogen Removal
• If the flow rate is too high, the slow-growing microorganisms
are washed out of the aeration tank
• Once ammonia is oxidized to nitrate, it is then reduced to
nitrogen by a broad range of facultative and anaerobic
bacteria like Pseudomonas in the presence of a carbon
source
• For this purpose, methanol (CH3OH) is often used
Nitrogen Removal

= Nitrite ion
Phosphate Removal
• Phosphate may be removed chemically or biologically
• The most popular chemical methods use lime, Ca(OH)2,
and alum, Al2(SO4)3
• Under alkaline conditions, the calcium ion will combine
with phosphate to form calcium hydroxyapatite
• Calcium hydroxyapatite is a white insoluble precipitate
that is settled out and removed from the wastewater
• Insoluble calcium carbonate (CaCO3) is also formed and
removed
• The calcium may be reclaimed by burning in a furnace

• Quick lime CaO is then slaked by adding water and forming

lime, which may be reused for phosphorous removal
• The aluminum ion from alum precipitates as very slightly
soluble aluminum phosphate,

• And also forms aluminum hydroxide,

• This aluminum hydroxide forms sticky flocks that help to

settle out phosphates
• Alum is usually added in the final clarifier and the amount
of alum needed to achieve a given level of phosphorous
removal depends on the amount of phosphorous in the
wastewater
Biological Phosphorous Removal
• It is becoming increasingly popular since it does not require
the addition of chemicals
• In this process, the aeration tank in the activated sludge
system is subdivided into zones
• Some of the zones are not aerated in which the aerobic
microorganisms become sorely stressed because of lack of
oxygen
• If these microorganisms are transferred to an aerated
zone, they try to makeup for the lost time and assimilate
organic matter (as well as phosphorous) at a rate much
higher than they ordinarily would
• Once the microorganisms have adsorbed the
phosphorous, they are removed as waste activated
sludge, thus carrying with them high concentrations of
phosphorous
• This technique allows up to 90 % removal of
phosphorous
DISINFECTION
• The law requires that municipal wastewater treatment
plant effluents be disinfected before they are discharged to
receiving water bodies

• Chlorine is commonly used for this purpose and a chlorine

contact chamber is used as the last unit operation in the
treatment plant

• Typically, 30 minutes of contact time is required to kill

microorganisms in the water
Block diagram of a complete Wastewater
treatment Plant