• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.31 no.11
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• pp.997-1006
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• 2009

Organic removal efficiency and methane production rate, a feasibility of power generation from biogas, and the optimum conditions for membrane operation were evaluated for the pilot scale (5 tons/day) two-phase anaerobic digestion coupled with ultra filtration (TPADUF) system fed with garbage leachate. The TPADUF system is consisted of a thermophilic acidogenic reactor, a mesophilic methanogenic reactor, and an UF membrane. When garbage leachate with 150 g/L of TCOD was fed to the TPADUF up to organic loading rate (OLR) of 11.1 g COD/L/d, the effluent TCOD was lower than 6 g/L and the average removal efficiencies of TCOD and SCOD were higher than 95%. The methane composition of the gas was 65%, and the methane yield was 39 $m^3/m^3$ garbage leachatefed, 260 $m^3$/tons $COD_{added}$, or 270 $m^3$/tons $COD_{removed}$, even there was some gas leak. The power production per consumed gas was 0.96 kWh/$m^3$ gas or 1.49 kWh/$m^3$ methane. This lower power production efficiency mainly due to the small capacity of gas engine (15 kW class). The membrane was operated at the average flux of 10 L/$m^2$/hr. When the flux decreased, washing with water and chemical (NaOCl) was conducted to restore the flux. In the TPADUF system, optimum pH could be maintained without alkali addition by recycling the membrane concentrate or mixed liquor of the methanogenic digester to the acidogenic reactor. Also, partial production of methane in the acidogenic reactor had a positive effect on lowering the OLR of the methanogenic reactor.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.27 no.10
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• pp.1052-1057
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• 2005

Recently, the ozone treatment of wasting activated sludge has become one of the effective and feasible process for the sludge reduction. The objective of this study is to investigate the availability of ozonized wasting sludge on external carbon sources 13r phosphorus release. Experiment results showed that the ozone treatment of activated sludge could produce a large amount of VFA such as acetic acid and isobutyric acid. For example, 50.24 mg/L acetic acid was produced with the ozone dose of 0.05 g $O_3/g$ SS, and 123.56 mg/L acetic acid with 0.5 g $O_3/g$ SS. The higher ozone dose was applied, the more VFA was produced from sludge reduction into a limited point. Finally, using ozonated sludge as only carbon source, the batch experiment, to measure phosphorus release rate in anaerobic condition were performed. The specific phosphorus release rates were investigated as 0.94, 1.37, 1.48, 1.68 mg P/g VSS/hr with ozone dose of 0.05, 0.1, 0.2, 0.5 g $O_3/g$ SS, respectively. Considering the degree of mineralization, VFA production, phosphorus release rate, and economical aspect, the optimal ozone dose for sludge reduction and using carbon sources ranged from 0.05 to 0.1 g $O_3/g$ SS.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.51 no.4
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• pp.374-381
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• 2015

Occurrences of coastal dredged materials are ever increasing due to port construction, navigational course maintenance and dredging of polluted coastal sediments. Ocean dumping of the coastal dredged materials has become virtually prohibited as London Treaty will be enacted as of the year 2012. It will be necessary to treat and recycle the dredged materials that may carry organic pollutants and heavy metals in a reasonable and effective process: collection of the dredged materials, liquid and solid separation, and treatment of organic compounds and heavy metals. In this study we have developed a continuous bioreactor system that can treat a mixture of silt and particulate organic matter using a microbial consortium (BM-S-1). The steady-state operation conditions were: pH (7.4-7.5), temperature ($16^{\circ}C$), DO (7.5-7.9), and salt concentration (3.4-3.7%). The treatment efficiencies of SCOD, T-N and T-P of the mixture were 95-96%, 92-99%, and 79-97%. The system was also effective in removal of heavy metals such as Zn, Ni, and Cr. Levels of MLSS during three months operation period were 11,000-19,000 mg/L. Interestingly, there was little sludge generated during this period of operation. The augmented microbial consortium seemed to be quite active in the removal of the organic component (30%) present in the dredged material in association with indigenous bacteria. The dominant phyla in the treatment processes were Proteobacteria and Bacteroidetes while dominant genii were Marinobacterium, Flaviramulus, Formosa, Alteromonadaceae_uc, Flavobacteriaceae_uc. These results will contribute to a development of a successful bioremediation technology for various coastal and river sediments with a high content of organic matter, inorganic nutrients and heavy metals, leading to a successful reuse of the polluted dredged sediments.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.39 no.11
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• pp.599-606
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• 2017

The effects of microbubble-oxygen physicochemical method for the removal of organic pollutants, nitrogen, and phosphorus contained in animal manure were investigated using a laboratory scale single reactor. The characteristics of used livestock manure were $36,894{\pm}5,024mg\;TCOD/L$, $22,031{\pm}2,018mg\;SCOD/L$, $4,150{\pm}35mg\;NH_4-N/L$, and $659{\pm}113mg\;PO_4-P/L$. It was confirmed that the amount of organic pollutants, nitrogen, and phosphorus removal was increased by the use of oxygen rather than air as the gas supplied with the microbubble, and by input of larger oxygen amount. When the oxygen was fed with 600 mL flow rate per minute, TCOD and phosphorus removal were 2.5 times and 5.6 times higher than those of air supplied. As the microbubble-oxygen reaction time was longer, the removal rate of nutrients increased gradually. The removal rates of ammonium and phosphorus reach to $41.03{\pm}0.20%$ and $65.49{\pm}1.39%$, respectively, after 24 hours. When the coagulation treatment method was applied to increase phosphorus removal rate from the effluent of microbubble-oxygen treatment, the phosphorus was removed up to 92.7%. However, the removal rate of organic pollutants (TCOD) was as small as $28.7{\pm}0.2%$ within the first 6 hours, and then the negligible removal of TCOD was recorded. This study suggests that microbubble-oxygen can be applied not only livestock manure but also aeration tank of various wastewater treatment plant, which can reduce the load on the associated unit process and produce stable high-quality effluent.

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.5-13
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• 2022

The current environmental problem is that environmental pollution is accelerating due to the generation of large amounts of waste and indiscriminate consumption of energy. Fossil fuels, a representative energy production fuel, are burned in the process of producing energy, generating a large amount of greenhouse gases and eventually causing climate change. In addition, the amount of waste generated worldwide is continuously increasing, and environmental pollution is occurring in the process of waste treatment. One of the methods for simultaneously solving these problems is the energy recovery from and reduction of organic wastes. Sewage sludge generated in sewage treatment plants has been treated in various ways since ocean disposal was completely prohibited, but the amount generated has been continuously increasing. Since the sewage sludge contains a large amount of organic materials, it is desirable to recover energy from the sewage sludge and reduce the final discharged waste through anaerobic digestion. However, most of the excess sludge is a mass of microorganisms used in sewage treatment, and in order for the excess sludge to be anaerobically digested, the cell walls of the microorganisms must be destroyed first, but it takes a lot of time to destroy the cell walls, so high rates of biogas production and waste reduction cannot be achieved only by anaerobic digestion. Therefore, the pre-treatment process of solubilizing excess sludge is required, and the thermal solubilization process is verified to be the most efficient among various solubilization methods, and high rates of biogas production and waste reduction can be achieved by anaerobic digestion after destroying cell walls the thermal solubilization process. In this study, when pretreating TS 10% thickened excess sludge through a thermal solubilization system, a study was conducted on solubilization characteristics according to retention time and operating temperature variables. The experimental variables for the retention time of the thermal solubilization system were 30 minutes, 60 minutes, 90 minutes, and 120 minutes, respectively, while the operating temperature was fixed at 160℃. The soulbilization rates calculated through TCOD and SCOD derived from the experimental results increased in the order of 12.11%, 20.52%, 28.62%, and 31.40%, respectively. And the variables according to operating temperature were 120℃, 140℃, 160℃, 180℃, and 200℃, respectively, while the operating retention time was fixed at 60 minutes. And the solubilization rates increased in the order of 7.14%, 14.52%, 20.52%, 40.72%, and 57.85%, respectively. In addition, TS, VS, T-N, T-P, NH₄⁺-N, and VFAs were analyzed to evaluate thermal solubilization characteristics of thickened excess sludge. As a result, in order to obtain 30% or more solubilization rate through thermal solubilization of TS 10% thickened excess sludge, 120 minutes of retention time is required when the operating temperature is fixed to 160℃, and 170℃ or more of operating temperature is needed when the operating time is fixed to 60 minutes.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.139-147
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• 2021

Livestock manure is used as an organic fertilizer to replace chemical fertilizers after sufficient fermentation in an aerobic bioreactor. On the other hand, liquid manure disposal problems occur repeatedly because soil spraying is restricted during the summer when the crops are growing. To use liquid fertilizer (LF) as an additional nutrient source for crops, it is necessary to reduce the amount of suspended solids (SS) in the liquid fertilizer and secure stability problems against pathogenic microorganisms. This study examined the effects of the simultaneous SS removal and E.coli sterilization in the LF using the microbubble (MB) generator (FeMgO catalyst insertion). The remaining SS were further removed using the integrated microbubble and microfilter system. During the floating process in the MB device, the SS were removed by 57.9%, and the coliform group was not detected (16,200→0 MPN/100 mL). By optimizing the HRT of the integrated system, the removal efficiency of the SS was improved by 92.9% under the 0.1h of HRT condition. After checking the properties of the treated LF, 64.5%, 70.1%, 54.9%, and 51.5% of the TCOD, SCOD, PO4-P, and TN, respectively, were removed. The treated effluent from such an integrated system has a lower SS content than that of the existing LF and does not contain coliforms; therefore, it can be used directly as an additional fertilizer.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.497-505
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• 2005

Domestic Sewage Treatment Plants are mostly based on biological treatment, in which large amounts of excess sludge are generated and occupy about 40 ~ 60% of the total sewage treatment costs. Several methods for sludge treatment has been so far reported as upgrading biodegradation of sludge; heat treatment, chemical treatment, including thermo-alkali and ozone, mechanical treatment including ultrasonic pulverization. But, it has a limitation in case of reducing the amount of excess sludge which are already producted. In this study, application of excess sludge reduction process using thermophilic aerobic bacteria for activated sludge was examined. The research was carried out two different stage. one for a biological wastewater treatment and the other for a thermophilic aerobic solubilization of the waste sludge. A portion of excess sludge from the wastewater treatment step was into the thermophilic aerobic sludge solubilization reactor, in which the injected sludge was solubilized by thermophilic aerobic bacteria. The solubilized sludge was returned to the aeration tank in the wastewater treatment step for its further degradation. Sludge solubilization reactor was operated at $63{\pm}2^{\circ}C$ with hydraulic retention time(HRT) of 1.5 ~ 1.7 day. Control group was operated with activated sludge process(AS) and experiment group was operated with three conditions(RUN 1, RUN 2, RUN3). RUN 1 was operated with AS without sludge solubilization reactor. RUN 2 were operated with AS with sludge solubilization reactor to examine correlation between sludge circulation ratio and sludge reduction ratio by setting up sludge circulation ratio to 3. RUN 3 was operated with sludge circulation ratio of 3 and MLSS concentration of 1,700~2,000mg/L to examine optimum operation condition. The quantity of excess sludge production was reduced sharply and in operation of RUN 3, sludge The quantity of excess sludge production was reduced sharply and in operation of RUN 3, sludge solubilization ratio and sludge reduction ratio were 53. 7%, 95.2% respectively. After steady state operation, average concentration of TBOD, SBOD, $TCOD_{Cr}$, $SCOD_{Cr}$, TSS, VSS, T-N, T-P of effluent were 4.5, 1.7, 27 .8, 13.8, 8.1, 6.2, 15.1, 1.8mg/L in the control group and were 5.6, 2.0, 28.6, 19.1, 9.7, 7.2, 16.1, 2.0mg/L in the experimental group respectively. They were appropriate to effluent standard of Sewage Treatment Plants.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.35 no.5
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• pp.371-380
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• 2013

Though MBR process has many advantages, the greatest risk factors in operating MBR process are occurrence of membrane fouling and decrease of flux. It is very difficult to find exact mechanism due to complex influence by many effects, although there have been recently many studies of membrane fouling. The purposes of this study are firstly evaluating bioreactor of lab-scale and micro-filtration hollow fiber membrane, secondly investigating correlation between foulants affecting membrane performance and membrane fouling, and lastly evaluating various parameters affecting fouling and applicability of membrane fouling reducer. This study found that TMP was increasing rapidly and showed 0.32 bar and the average of flux was 88 LMH. EPS concentration tends not to change much above MLSS concentration (6,000 mg/L). However, EPS concentration variation is wide below MLSS concentration (6,000 mg/L). Also, from results of membrane surface condition and element analysis using SEM/EDX, carbon and fluorine were founded to be the highest percentage in membrane because of characteristics of membrane material. In operating continuously, inorganic fouling was generated by increase of these inorganic substances such as $Al^{3+}$ and $Mg^{2+}$. Lastly, the best filtration performance was obtained for 0.03 mg MFR/mg MLSS by results of particle size, zeta potential, $SCOD_{cr}$, EPS and MLSS concentration.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.121-127
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• 2016

BACKGROUND: Anaerobic digestion is the most feasible technology because not only the energy embedded in organic matters can be recovered, but also they are stabilized while being degraded. This study carried out to improve methane yield of slaughterhouse wastewater treatment sludge cake by the thermal pre-treatment prior to anaerobic digestion.METHODS AND RESULTS: Slaughterhouse wastewater treatment sludge cake was pre-treated by the closed hydrothermal reactor at reaction temperature of 190℃. BMPs (Biochemical methane potential) of the thermal hydrolysate was tested in the different S(Substrate)/I(Inoculum) ratio conditions. COD(Chemical oxygen demand) and SCOD(Soluble chemical oxygen demand) contents of thermal hydrolysate were 10.99% and 10.55%, respectively, then, the 96.00% of COD was remained as a soluble form. The theoretical methane potential of thermal hydrolysate was 0.51 Nm³ kg^-1-VS_added. And BMPs were decreased from 0.56 to 0.22 Nm³ kg^-1-VS_added when S/I ratio were increased from 0.1 to 2.0 in the VS content basis. Those were decreased from 0.32 to 0.13 Nm³ kg^-1-COD_added when S/I ratio were increased from 0.1 to 2.0 based on COD content. The anaerobic degradability of VS basis have showed 196.9%, 102.2%, 80.7%, 67.4%, and 39.4% in S/I ratios of 0.1, 0.3, 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0, respectively. Also the COD of 119.6%, 76.3%, 70.1%, 69.0%, and 43.1% were degraded anaerobically in S/I ratios of 0.1, 0.3, 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0, respectively.CONCLUSION: BMPs obtained in the S/I ratios of 0.1 and 0.3 was overestimated by the residual organic matters remaining at the inoculum. And inhibitory effect was observed in the highest S/I ratio of 2.0. The optimum S/I ratios giving reasonable BMPs might be in the range of 0.5 and 1.0 in S/I ratio. Therefore VS biodegradability of thermal hydrolysate was in 67.4-80.7% and COD biodegradability showed 69.0-70.1%.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.27 no.9
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• pp.917-922
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• 2005

The wastewaters from textile and dyeing industries are difficult to treat due to its high pH, temperature, color intensity and non-biodegradable organic contents. This study investigated the removal of recalcitrant organics in a dyeing wastewater by using a packed bed reactor (PBR) that contained cell-immobilized pellets. The feed, obtained from an effluent of a biological treatment plant, had $SCOD_{Cr}$ of 330 mg/L and $SBOD_5$ of 20 mg/L on average. In immobilizing the cells to a Polyethylene Glycol(PEG) based medium, activated sludges from either a sewage treatment plant or an industrial wastewater treatment plant were used. When the empty bed contact time (EBCT) was above 8 hrs in the PBR, the $COD_{Cr}$ removal efficiency was over 50% and the $COD_{Mn}$ concentration was 72 mg/L or lower on average, which was substantially lower than the discharge standard of 90 mg/L. The results indicated that the optimum EBCT in the PBR was 8 hrs. The PBR with cell-immobilized pellets was effective as an advanced treatment process after an activated sludge process for treating dyeing wastewaters.