• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.212-221
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• 2011

Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) are required to meet the reinforced discharge standards which are differentiated as 0.2, 0.3 and 0.5 mg-TP/L for the district I, II and III, respectively. Although most of WWTPs are operating advanced biological phosphorus removal system, the supplementary phosphorus treatment facility using chemical addition should be required almost at all WWTPs. Therefore, water quality data from several exemplary full-scale plants operating phosphorus treatment process were analyzed to evaluate the reliability of removal performance. Additionally, a series of jar tests were conducted to find optimal coagulants dose for phosphorus removal by chemical precipitation and to describe characteristics of the reaction and sludge production. Chemical costs and the increasing sludge volume in physicochemical phosphorus removal process were estimated based on the results of jar tests. The minimum coagulant (aluminium sulfate and poly aluminium chloride) doses to keep TP concentration below 0.5 and 0.2 mg/L were around 25 and 30 mg/L (as $Al_2O_3$), respectively, in the mixed liquor of activated sludge. In the tertiary treatment facility, relatively lower coagulant doses of 1/12~1/3 the minimum doses for activated sludge were required to achieve the same TP concentrations of 0.2~0.5 mg/L. Increase in suspended solids concentration due to chemical precipitates in mixed liquor was estimated at 10~11%, compared to the concentration without chemical addition. When coagulant was added into mixed liquor, chemical (aluminium sulfate) cost was estimated to be 4~10 times higher than in secondary effluent coagulation/separation process. Sludge production to be wasted was also 4~10 times higher than secondary effluent coagulation/separation process.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.47-54
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• 2014

Nanotechnology has become one of the fastest developing technologies and recently applied to a variety of industries. Thus, increasing number of nano materials including various nanoparticles would be discharged into wastewater and consequently entering a biological wastewater treatment process. However, the impact of the nano particles on biological wastewater treatment has not been estimated intensively. In this research, we investigated the effect of silica nanoparticle on the oxygen uptake rates (OURs) of activated sludge used in a conventional wastewater treatment process. The inhibition (%) values were estimated from the results of OURs experiments for the silica nanoparticles with various sizes of 10-15, 45-50, and 70-100 nm and concentrations of 50, 250, and 500 ppm. As results, the inhibition value was increased as the size of silica nano particles decreased and the injected concentration increased. The maximum inhibition value was investigated as 37.4 % for the silica nanoparticles with the size of 45-50 nm and concentration of 50 ppm. Additionally, the effect of size and concentration on the inhibition should be considered cautiously in case that the aggregation of particles occurred seriously so that the size of individual particles was increased in aquatic solution.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.22 no.11
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• pp.2037-2046
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• 2000

It has been reported that the inhibition effect of pH on activated sludge follows noncompetitive inhibition kinetics. However. the noncompetitive inhibition kinetic equation can not be directly applied to pH inhibition because of the difficulty in quantification of pH in terms of inhibitor concentration. So, many empirical equations have been developed to describe the pH inhibition effect especially for acidic condition. In this research. the pseudo toxic concentration ($C_{PT}$) concept model to quantify pH inhibition effect on activated sludge was proposed and compared to other existing models. The $C_{PT}$ concept model can explain the reduction of the maximum specific growth rate (${\mu}_{max}$) caused by the pH inhibition more accurately than any other models, at a wide range of pH. The only model parameter. $K_I$ can be easily estimated by Lineweaver-Burk linearization method.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.37 no.9
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• pp.526-532
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• 2015

A bioreactor filling with pellets and stones was equipped to the swine manure treatment system, which is expected to emit high concentration of odor in the process of the organic wastewater treatment system, and in comparison with the activated sludge process as the control process, the reactor operation state, treatment water quality and odor emission concentration were measured. The reactor using the bioreactor proved to be much more stable in the bubble condition, treatment water transparency, etc, and BOD removal efficiency was also much better. The removal efficiency of T-N and T-P, however, showed little difference in the two reactors. Odor, as a result of examining $NH_3-N$, $NH_3$ concentratio, and complex odor, was 4 times to 24 times less emitted in the system using bioreactor than in the activated sludge system. $H_2S$, methyl mercaptan, dimethyl sulfide, and dimethyl disulfide were not found or were found in only 5 ppbs in each reactor and showed little difference between the two reactors. In the bioreactor process, Bacillus sp./ Pseudomonas sp. species were mainly found and in the activated sludge process, acterium sp. Chryseobacterium sp. species were mainly found.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.177-183
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• 2016

Sewage treatment using microorganisms is affected by multiple factors such as microbial properties, characteristics of sewage and operating conditions, and nanoparticles inflow may cause negative effects on sewage treatment system especially on the system stability and efficiency. It was studied to assess the toxic effects of nanoparticles on microorganism growth. The activated sludge in the sewage treatment plant of university was cultured in the optimized medium for each strain. Bacillus (gram-positive), Pseudomonas and E.coli (gram-negative) in the activated sludge were selected as target microorganisms, and ZnO and $TiO_2$ were chosen as nanoparticles. For same concentration of nanoparticles, average growth inhibition rate of Bacillus was 60% or more, while that of Pseudomonas was less than 10%. The toxicity of nanoparticles was shown to be higher for gram-positive bacteria than gram-negative bacteria because of their differences on structure of cell wall, components of cell wall protein, physiology of cells and metabolism. ZnO affected 3 times more negative on the growth of microorganisms as compared to $TiO_2$. It was assumed that, therefore, toxicity of ZnO was found to be greater than $TiO_2$.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.444-450
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• 2011

Perchlorate ($ClO_4^-$) is a contaminant found in surface water and soil/ground water. Autotrophic perchlorate-reducing bacteria (PRB) use hydrogen gas ($H_2$) as an electron donor to remove perchlorate. Since iron corrosion can produce $H_2$, feasibility of autotrophic perchlorate-removal using zero-valent iron (ZVI) was examined in this study using activated sludge that is easily available from a wastewater treatment plant. Batch test showed that activated sludge microorganisms could successfully degrade perchlorate in the presence of ZVI. The perchlorate biodegradation was confirmed by molar yield of $Cl^-$ as perchlorate was degraded. Scanning electron microscope revealed that rod-shaped microorganisms on the surface of iron particles used for the autotrophic perchlorate-removal, suggesting that iron particles could serve as supporting media for the formation of biofilm as well. DGGE analyses revealed that microbial profile of the inoculum (activated sludge) was different from that of biofilm sample obtained from the ZVI-added enrichment culture used for $ClO_4^-$-degradation. A major band of the biofilm sample was most closely related to the class Clostridia.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.9-14
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• 2009

In this research, a polyester manufacturing company (i.e. K Co.) in Gumi, South Korea was investigated regarding the release of high concentrations of 1,4-dioxane(about 600 mg/L) and whether treatment prior to release should occur to meet with the level of the regulation standard (e.g., 5 mg/L in 2011). The pilot-scale (reactor volume, 10 $m^3$) treatment system using Photo-Fenton Oxidation was able to remove approximately 90% of 1,4-dioxane under the conditions that concentrations of 2,800 ppm $H_2O_2$ and 1,400 ppm $FeSO_4$ were maintained along with 10 UV-C lamps (240 ${\mu}W/cm^2$) illuminated during aeration. However, the effluent concentration of 1,4-dioxane was still high at about 60 mg/L. Thus, further investigation is needed to see whether the bench scale (reactor volume, 8.9 L) of activated sludge could facilitate the decomposition of 1,4-dioxane. As a result, 1,4-dioxane in the effluent has been decreased as low as about 2~3 mg/L. Consequently, Photo-Fenton Oxidation coupled with activated sludge process can make it possible to efficiently decompose 1,4-dioxane to keep up with that of the regulation standard.

• Journal of environmental and Sanitary engineering
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.59-68
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• 1997

The main purpose of this study was to determine effects of BS-SBR compared with SBR on the removal of soluble organics and sludge separation. In the BS-SBR process, soluble organics were removed by suspended activated sludge as well as biological fixed films and these two processes occurred simultaneously in one tank. The removal efficiency of soluble COD in the BS-SBR, approximately 97% in both 1 and 3-cycle/d was higher than for SBR. The BS-SBR process was very efficient for SS removal. The averaged SS concentration were 4.8 mg/l over the operation period, the daily SS values were consistently below 10 mg/l in both of 1-cycle and 3-cycle a day. The sludge settling characteristics in BS-SBR were totally different from SBR's. The sludge, dark brown, was well flocculated and its floc size was visible larger than the SBR's.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.113-119
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• 2011

The study purpose was to examine an effect of zero emission of excess sludge on biological reactor and treated water quality within the biological reactor in the process of biological treatment combined with excess sludge reduction system with ozone. Under an ozone injection rate 0.03 g $O_3/g$ SS, Sludge Disintegration Number (SDN) 3 and less than pH 4 as pre-treatment process, it was possible to maintain a stable biological treatment process without sludge disintegration. In the test of $OUR_{max}$, of sludge, its value was hardly under the condition of ozone injection rate 0.03 g $O_3/g$ SS. There were almost no changes of MLVSS/MLSS within biological reactor followed by a solubilization of excess sludge. Accumulation of microorganism within biological reactor was also not observed. After solubilization of excess sludge, an increase for organic matter and SS concentrations of an effluent was not observed and T-N concentration was reduced by increasing nitrification and denitrification rate within biological reactor. Most of T-P was not removed by zero emission of excess sludge and was leaked by being included in effluents.

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.126-137
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• 2006

Behaviors of simple organic compound and granular sludge in an upflow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor treating propionate at high ammonia nitrogen levels were investigated for 12 months. The UASB reactor achieved about 80% removal of chemical oxygen demand (COD) at ammonia nitrogen concentration up to 6000 mg-N/L. At higher concentration of ammonia nitrogen, the propionate in the effluent increased whereas the acetate was very low. At ammonia nitrogen concentration of 8000 mg-N/L, the volatile suspended solids (VSS) increased sharply due probably to the decrease of the content of extracellular polymer (ECP) although methane production was very low. The specific methanogenic activity (SMA) using formate, acetate, and propionate as substrate to granules decreased as ammonia nitrogen concentration increased. The ammonia nitrogen concentration $I^{50}$, causing 50% inhibition of SMA were 2666, 4778 and 5572 mg-N/L, respectively. The kinetic coefficients of ammonia inhibition using formate, acetate, and propionate as substrate were 3.279, 0.999 and 0.609, respectively. The SMA using formate was severely affected by ammonia nitrogen than those using acetate and propionate. This result indicated that the hydrogenotrophic methanogens was most affected by ammonia nitrogen. Granules were mainly composed of microcolonies of methanothrix-like bacteria resembling bamboo-shape, and several other microcolonies including propionate degrader with juxtapositioned syntrophic associations between the hydrogen-producing acetogens and hydrogen-consuming methanogens.