Jimma Institute Of Technology

Advanced Wastewater Treatment

1.Tofik Gali RM 0163/13

2.Yared Endale RM 0161/13
July 6,2021 GC

Jimma, Ethiopia
 Introduction
 Nitrogen can deplete oxygen by nitrification, fertilize aquatic plant growth,

exhibit toxicity toward aquatic life, affect chlorine disinfection efficiency

and present a public health hazard

• Before the final selection of the appropriate removal technology, some questions

must be answered:

1. What are the forms and concentration of the pollutants in the focused ecosystem?
 Cont..

2.Are these forms and concentrations changing over time? If “yes”,

what are the processes involved?

3. From what sources the pollutants came?

• In the last few years, different parts of the world have been facing

the problem of nitrogen pollution in the environment.

 Cont..

The main forms of nitrogen are

1.ammonia (NH3),

2.nitrate (NO3 - ) and

3. nitrite (NO2 - )

 Nitrate is the most stable form in water, almost all sources of aqueous nitrogen

tending to be converted to nitrate. Nitrate (NO3 - ) is an inorganic compound

that dissolves easily in water and can be used in agricultural fields as fertilizer
 Cont..

• Nitrate anions are applied as plant nutrients but become an important

problem when their amounts exceed.

 Many traditional methods have been applied to the removal of nitrogen

compounds from wastewater, including

 physical processes

 chemical processes

 biological de-nitrification processes

 2. THE NITROGEN CYCLE
• The biogeochemical cycles include the nitrogen cycle, in which atmospheric

nitrogen is converted to many chemical forms (ammonium-NH4 + , nitrite-

NO2 - , or nitrate-NO3 - , through different processes: This processes are:

1.nitrogen fixation 3. nitrification

2.ammonification (mineralization), 4. denitrification

 1.Nitrogen fixation:

• Is any natural or industrial process that causes free nitrogen  (N2),

which is a relatively inert gas plentiful in air, to combine chemically

with other elements to form more-reactive nitrogen compounds

 such as ammonia, nitrates, or nitrites.

 Cont..

Under ordinary conditions, nitrogen does not react with other

elements. Yet nitrogenous compounds are found in all fertile soils, in all

living things, in many foodstuffs, in coal, and in such naturally occurring

chemicals as sodium nitrate (saltpetre) and ammonia. Nitrogen is also

found in the nucleus of every living cell as one of the chemical

components of DNA.
 2.Ammonification

• It is the process by which microorganisms  present in soil, sediment, or water

mineralize low molecular weight, dissolved, organic molecules presenting

amine or amide groups (of general formula R-NH2) and produce ammonium

(NH4+)
 Cont..

Gross ammonification: the amount of mineralized organic

molecules, ammonification activity, the activity of microbial

enzymes responsible for ammonification in a given environment.

Net ammonification: the release of NH4+ in the environment. 

 3.Nitrification

• Nitrification is a microbial process by which reduced nitrogen

compounds (primarily ammonia) are sequentially oxidized to nitrite

and nitrate

• Ammonia is present in drinking water through either naturally-

occurring processes or through ammonia addition during secondary

disinfection to form chloramines. The nitrification process is.

 Cont..

• Ammonia gas dissolves easily in water to form ammonium

hydroxide, a caustic solution and weak base. 

• Ammonia gas is easily compressed and forms a clear liquid under

pressure primarily accomplished by two groups of autotrophic

nitrifying bacteria that can build organic molecules using energy

obtained from inorganic sources, in this case ammonia or nitrite

 Cont..
• In the first step of nitrification, ammonia-oxidizing bacteria oxidize ammonia
to nitrite according to equation

• Nitrosomonas is the most frequently identified genus associated with this

step, although other genera, including Nitrosococcus, and Nitrosospira
 Cont..

• Nitrobacter is the most frequently identified genus associated with

this second step, although other genera, including Nitrospina,

Nitrococcus, and Nitrospira can also autotrophically oxidize nitrite

• Various groups of heterotrophic bacteria and fungi can also carry

out nitrification, although at a slower rate than autotrophic

organisms
 4.Denitrification
• Nitrate formed may serve as fertilizer for plants. Nitrate produced in excess of

the needs of plant life is carried away in water percolating through the soil

because the soil does not have the ability to hold nitrate.

• This frequently results in relatively high concentrations of nitrate in

groundwater. Under anaerobic conditions nitrate is reduced to nitrate, and

then reduction of nitrite occurs. This process is called denitrification.

 Cont..

• The effects of nitrogen discharge are: fertilization (eutrophication) of

aquatic ecosystems; oxygen depletion in aquatic ecosystems; toxicity to

aquatic life and contamination of ground water by nitrate and its effect

on the public health

• The main concern about eutrophication is correlated with the rapidly

increasing amounts of phosphorus and nitrogen,

Fig1.Nitrogen cycle
 METHODS OF NITROGEN COMPOUNDS REMOVAL

 Different processes have been applied to the removal of nitrogen

compounds

1.Biological denitrification method

2.ion exchange method

3. Reverse osmosis (RO)

4. Electro dialysis (ED)

5. Adsorption method
 Cont..
Nitrogen behave different forms in the environment. There are

various advantage of nitrogen based compound . Some advantages

and dis advantage of nitrogen based compound (Nitrogen fertilizer)

are the following

 1.Biological denitrification method

The biological denitrification has been used intensively for the

reduction of nitrate ions from wastewater

By this method, nitrate is converted to nitrogen gas by denitrifying

bacteria in the absence of oxygen:

Fig 2.Biological denitrification method
 Cont..

 Denitrification can be achieved using both heterotrophic and autotrophic

bacteria. In order to achieve heterotrophic denitrification, an organic
compound is used as the carbon and energy source
Eg. methanol, glucose, acetate, ethanol or acetic acid

 For the autotrophic denitrification, an inorganic energy source is

necessary: sulphur, reduced sulphur species (e.g. thiosulphate) or
hydrogen gas; the carbon dioxide or bicarbonate were used as carbon
sources
 2. Ion exchange method
 Ion exchange involves the removal of dissolved nitrate ions from water
and wastewater by exchanging them with chloride ions on anion
exchange resin
 When the capacity of the resins is exhausted, it can be regenerated by
using a sodium chloride solution with high concentration, in order to
displace the nitrate on the resin.
 Ion exchange is a method with high efficiency, simple operation and
relatively low cost
Fig.3 Ion exchange method
 3. Reverse osmosis (RO)
• Reverse osmosis (RO) is a pressure-driven membrane separation method,

in which a feed stream under pressure is separated into a purified

permeate and a concentrated stream by selective permeation of water

through a semi-permeable membrane.

• Membranes generally contain cellulose acetate, polyamides and composite

materials
 Cont..

• Ammonia gas dissolves easily in water to form ammonium hydroxide, a

caustic solution and weak base. 

•  It is easily compressed and forms a clear liquid under pressure.In practice,

this method is applied for water desalination and for treatment of diverse

wastewaters.

• They showed that nitrogen was reduced from 42.5 mg/L in the RO feed to

only 0.9 mg/L in the RO product water (98% removal).

 4. Adsorption method
• Adsorption method involves collecting soluble in solution on a suitable interface.

The adsorbents can be recycled easily and do not contain harmful pollutants in

component.

• Furthermore, this process can eliminate or minimize different types of organic and

inorganic pollutants from wastewater and therefore, it has a wider applicability in

water pollution control.

Fig.4 Adsorption method
 Cont..

Nitrogen separation from domestic wastewater by reverse osmosis

No pretreatment was necessary for tubular RO membranes in addition

to the existing chemical precipitation performed in the main

treatment plant.
 Cont..

• The spiral RO elements, however, did receive additional 25–200

μm cartridge filters as pretreatment

• This was essential as solid separation in the chemical precipitation

pretreatment plant was unpredictable, and carry-over solids easily

clogged the spiral-wound flow channels.

 Cont..

 This was especially a problem for treatment of combined domestic-

industrial wastewater and not during treatment of domestic
wastewater only

• Chemical precipitated effluent from the main treatment plant was

the feed to the RO units.

 Cont..

 Sorption can be classified upon the type of bonding involved

a) Physical sorption (or physisorption): no exchange of electrons take place; the

adsorbate is held to the surface by the relatively weak Van der Waals forces, the

process of physical adsorption being easily reversed.

b) Chemical sorption (or chemisorption): the chemical bonds involve an exchange

between specific surface sites and solute molecules.

 Cont..

a) it is characterized by interaction energies between the surface and

adsorbate comparable to the strength of chemical bonds,

chemisorption being much stronger and much more stable.

b) The use of activated carbon is a traditional method to treat

wastewater.
 Cont..

However, activated carbon is expensive. Several studies presented the

removal of nitrate from water by carbon based adsorbents such as

 powdered activated carbon (PAC)

 commercial granular activated carbon (GAC)

Also, many other materials have been used for the removal of nitrogen

compounds from water and wastewater: zeolite and modified zeolite

 Cont..

Zeolites :saturated with ammonia nitrogen were continuously

regenerated and circulated in the proposed process without the use of

chemical regenerates such as NaCl. Experimental results showed an 88–

92% removal of ammonia nitrogen and high settle ability in the final

clarifier for both examples of wastewater.

 How does zeolite remove nitrogen ?

Due to the large microporous surface area inside

the zeolite adsorbents, the portable oxygen concentrator using the PSA

technique can adsorb nitrogen from air and output an enriched oxygen

stream under high-pressure conditions

 Cont..

For the surface modification of zeolites, certain surfactants can

be used and the produced zeolite is called a surfactant-

modified zeolite (SMZ). ... Emphasis is given to the

surface modification of natural zeolites by cationic surfactants

and the ability of SMZ to sorb anions.

Fig 5.Different types of zeolitic material
Fig.6 preparation and characterization of
cationic surfactant modified absorbent
Thank you !!!!!