Powdered activated carbon addition for fouling control in anaerobic membrane bioreactor

Sohn, Weonjung; Guo, Wenshan; Ngo, Huu Hao; Deng, Lijuan; Cheng, Dongle

doi:10.1016/j.biteb.2021.100721

Cited by 11 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 49 publications

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“…Lei et al [ 8 ] indicated that PAC addition in anaerobic MBR mitigated the membrane fouling due to the restriction of cake layer formation. Sohn et al [ 9 ] reported that PAC addition not only reduces the SMP and extracellular polymer substance (EPS) concentration, but also enhances the hydrophobicity and flocculation ability. Aslam et al [ 10 ] suggested that GAC can provide the high specific area for biofilm formation and mechanical cleaning on membrane surface, therefore alleviating the membrane fouling.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Biochar Addition in Membrane Bioreactor Enables Membrane Fouling Alleviation and Nitrogen Removal Improvement for Low C/N Municipal Wastewater Treatment

Wang

Shen

et al. 2023

Membranes

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Membrane bioreactors (MBRs) are frequently used to treat municipal wastewater, but membrane fouling is still the main weakness of this technology. Additionally, the low carbon-nitrogen (C/N) ratio influent has been shown to not only increase the membrane fouling, but also introduce challenges to meet the effluent discharge standard for nitrogen removal. Herein, the authors addressed the challenges by adding cost-effective biochar. The results suggested that the biochar addition can enable membrane fouling alleviation and nitrogen removal improvement. The reduced membrane fouling can be ascribed to the biochar adsorption capacity, which facilitates to form bigger flocs with carbon skeleton in biochar as a core. As a result, the biochar addition significantly altered the mixed liquor suspension with soluble microbial product (SMP) concentration reduction of approximately 14%, lower SMP protein/polysaccharide ratio from 0.28 ± 0.02 to 0.22 ± 0.03, smaller SMP molecular weight and bigger sludge particle size from 67.68 ± 6.9 μm to 113.47 ± 4.8 μm. The nitrogen removal is also dramatically improved after biochar addition, which can be due to the initial carbon source release from biochar, and formation of aerobic–anaerobic microstructures. Microbial diversity analysis results suggested more accumulation of denitrification microbes including norank_f__JG30-KF-CM45 and Plasticicumulans. Less relative abundance of Aeromonas after biochar addition suggested less extracellular polymer substance (EPS) secretion and lower membrane fouling rate.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%