Sewage sludge treatment by a continuous microwave enhanced advanced oxidation process

Abstract

A continuous flow mode of the microwave enhanced advanced oxidation process (MW/H2O2-AOP) was used for sludge treatment as opposed to a batch operation mode from past studies. The effects of pre-microwave heating, microwave irradiation and post-microwave holding on organic matter solubilization were studied. Pre-microwave heating did not improve the overall orthophosphate solubilization, but helped in organic matter solubilization. Nutrients and organic matter were found to have increased during the post-microwave holding period, indicating overall sludge solubilization can be more effective when maintained at a high temperature after treatment with the MW/H2O2-AOP. It was beneficial to operate a continuous mode of the MW/H2O2-AOP at a longer retention time for organic matter solubilization, and at a shorter retention time for orthophosphate solubilization. Sludge settleability was greatly improved with the microwave treatment, with or without the addition of H2O2. The pre-heating of sludge before treatment with the microwave process by the means of heat exchange can be beneficial for the overall organic matter solubilization in the MW/H2O2-AOP.

Rapid nonylphenol degradation in wastewater sludge using microwave peroxide oxidation with nitric acid

“…A lot of articles about AOPs have been published [22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30]. However, there is still a lack of information on AOP performance with real wastes for these previous researches so far.…”

Effect of pre-heating on microwave enhanced advanced oxidation process

“…Lo and Liao (2011) suggested an optimum MW temperature of 120°C for best nutrient recovery and solids disintegration from sludge and dairy manure in a batch mode MW/H 2 O 2 -AOP. However, continuous-flow 2450-MHz microwave systems, both laboratory-scale and pilot-scale, were tested at near 100°C or below (Yu et al, 2010;Zhang et al, 2013). Several researchers have carried out a comparative study on the performance of conventional (CH) and microwave heating processes (Chang et al, 2011;Eskicioglu et al, 2007;Mehdizadeh et al, 2013).…”