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Module B: Water and Wastewater Management
Lecture 3: Wastewater Treatment
NO-N 0
Org-N 7.8
Total phosphorus -
Ortho-P -
pH (unit) 7.7
http://www.fao.org/3/t0551e/t0551e05.htm
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https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/603906/adbi-cs2020-1.pdf
Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant
(WWTP)
Primary Treatment Secondary Treatment
Aeration tank
Influent PST SST
Screen Grit Chamber
Secondary sludge
Preliminary Treatment
Primary sludge
• The treatment may include mechanical, physical, biological, and chemical processes Gas holder
Digester
and is often an integrated system tank
• The integrated system consists of the conventional series of primary, secondary and
tertiary treatment processes
Sludge
drying beds
Storage
• All wastewater treatments involve removal of
tank
- solids
- bacteria
- algae
- plants
- organic & inorganic compounds
Preliminary Treatment
• This includes mechanical processes such as screening, grit removal, grinding,
flow equalization, fat and grease removal
• Screening: This is the first unit operation used at WWTPs.
• It removes large chunks and objects such as rags, papers, plastics and metals to
prevent damage and clogging of downstream equipment, piping and other
accessories
• Both coarse and fine screen filters are used for screening
• Coarse screens remove large solids, rags and debris from wastewater. Examples
include mechanically and manually cleaned bar screens and trash racks
Preliminary Treatment
• Fine screens are used to remove fine material that may create
operational and maintenance problems in downstream processes,
particularly in WWTPs that do not employ primary treatment
• Typical opening size of fine screens are 1.5 to 6 mm; very fine screens
of opening size 0.2 – 1.5 mm are also used sometimes
Grinders
• Comminutors/grinders reduce the size of coarser particles so that they can be
removed during downstream treatment operations
• Comminuting and grinding devices grind and shred material in the size range of
20 mm (0.75 inches)
• Grinders consist of two sets of counter rotating, intermeshing cutters that trap
and shear wastewater solids into a consistent typically 6 mm sized particles
Grit Removal
• Grit includes sand, gravel or other heavy solid materials that are
“heavier” (higher specific gravity) than the organic biodegradable
solids in the wastewater
• The removal of grit prevents abrasion and wear of mechanical
equipment, grit deposition in pipelines and channels, as well as the
accumulation of grit in anaerobic digesters and aeration basins.
• Grit removal is necessary as it also interferes with flow
measurement
• Grit removal facilities typically precede primary clarification and
follow screening and comminution
Primary Treatment
• It involves the separation of suspended organic matter (or human waste) from the
wastewater
• This is done by putting the wastewater into large settlement tanks for the solids to sink or
settle down to the bottom of the tank by gravity. The settled solids are called ‘sludge’
• At the bottom of these circular tanks, large scrappers continuously scrape the floor of the
tank and push the sludge towards the pump away for further treatment
• The rest of the water is then moved to the secondary treatment
Membrane Filtration
Reverse Osmosis
• In the reverse osmosis
process, pressure is used to
force effluent through a
membrane that retains
contaminants on one side
and allows the clean water
to pass to the other side.
• It can remove ions,
molecules and larger
particles of size greater
than 10 Angstrom
Nutrient Removal
• The nutrients in the form of Nitrogen and
Phosphorus present in the treated water are also
needed to be removed to prevent “Eutrophication”
of the water bodies where the water is discharged.
• Nitrogen present as ammonia can be toxic to
aquatic life and therefore should be removed
• Nitrifying bacteria is used to convert ammonia to
non-toxic nitrate via nitrification
• Nitrification should be sufficient to nullify the
toxicity of ammonia, but nitrate is a nutrient and
can contribute to eutrophication
Nutrient Removal
• Denitrification converts nitrate to nitrogen gas
• Effluent with nitrate is placed into a anoxic tank, where carbon-containing
chemicals, such as methanol, are added. In this oxygen-free environment,
bacteria use the oxygen attached to the nitrogen in the nitrate form releasing
nitrogen gas.
• Since nitrogen gas comprises almost 80% of the air in the earth's atmosphere, its
release into the atmosphere does not cause any environmental harm.
Phosphorus Control
• Phosphorus can be removed either through chemical or biological processes.
• In biological process, specific bacteria, called polyphosphate accumulating
organisms (PAOs), are selectively enriched in sludge
• They can accumulate large quantities of phosphorus within their cells (up to 20%
of their mass) and these biosolids after their separation from the treated water
have a high fertilizer value.
• Phosphorus removal can also be achieved by chemical precipitation, usually with
salts of iron, alum, or lime
• This may lead to excessive sludge productions as hydroxides precipitates and the
added chemicals can be expensive.
• Despite this, chemical phosphorus removal requires a significantly smaller
equipment footprint than biological removal, is easier to operate, and often more
reliable than biological phosphorus removal.
Assignment 3