A down-flow hanging sponge (DHS) bioreactor was operated for the treatment of domestic wastewater. The Stover-Kincannon model was applied for kinetic evaluation of the reactor performance during the operational period. As a result, the coefficient of determination (R 2) for straight lines of effluent concentration from the experimental data and from the predictive data of BOD5; NH4 +-N; and TN were 0.9727; 0.9883; and 0.9934, respectively. The calculation of saturation value constant (Umax-g L-1 d-1) and maximum utilization rate constant (KB-g L-1 d-1) were 56.818 and 75.034 for BOD5; 2.960 and 4.713 for NH4 +-N; 2.810 and 8.37 for TN, respectively. The study suggests that Stover-Kincannon model can be used for effective evaluation of kinetic removal of BOD5; NH4 +-N; and TN from domestic wastewater treated in a DHS bioreactor.

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This research was carried out to evaluate the effect of organic loading rate to the performance of anaerobic co-digestion digester treating organic fraction of food waste (FW) and sludge waste (SW) from wastewater treatment plant. The experiment was conducted in two runs: Run S50, substrate contained 50 % of FW and 50 % of SW in term of volatile solid (VS) concentration; Run S100 (control run) contained 100 % SW in the influent substrate. The experiment was performed in a 3L working volume reactor at ambient temperature with three levels of organic loading rate (OLR) as 2; 4; 6 kgVS/m3/day, the duration of experiment was 18 days for each level of OLR. As results, the average of biogas production rate (BPR) at OLR 2;4;6 kgVS/m3/day,in Run S50 and Run S100 was 390 – 520;  860 – 1220; 1140 - 2440 ml/day and 160 – 300; 560 – 640; 700 - 1400 ml/day, respectively. The maximum methane yield (mlCH4/gVSadded/day) of organic loading rate 2; 4; 6 kgVS/m3/day was 118.96; 326.49; 628.20 for Run S50 and; 58.28; 160.27; 255.54 for Run S100, respectively. In conclusion, Run S50 always produced higher biogas production rate and higher methane yield at all 3 OLR levels. The higer OLR could enhance BPR and methane yield but at OLR 6 kgVS/m3/day made unstable performance and high concentration of COD in the effluent. Therefore, in this experimental conditions it has better operation at OLR under 6 kgVS/m3/day for the stable performance of reactors.