Struvite Precipitation for Sustainable Recovery of Nitrogen and Phosphorus from Anaerobic Digestion Effluents of Swine Manure

Abstract

In this study, we propose the application of struvite precipitation for the sustainable recovery of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) from anaerobic digestion (AD) effluents derived from swine manure. The optimal conditions for four major factors that affect the recovery of N and P were derived by conducting batch experiments on AD effluents obtained from four AD facilities. The optimal conditions were a pH of 10.0, NH4-N:Mg:PO4-P molar ratio of 1:1.4:1, mixing intensity of 240 s−1, and mixing duration of 2 min. Under these optimal conditions, the removal efficiencies of NH4-N and PO4-P were approximately 74% and 83%, respectively, whereas those of Cu and Zn were approximately 74% and 79%, respectively. Herein, a model for swine manure treatment that incorporates AD, struvite precipitation, and biological treatment processes is proposed. We applied this model to 85 public biological treatment facilities in South Korea and recovered 4722 and 51 tons/yr of NH4-N and PO4-P, respectively. The economic analysis of the proposed model’s performance predicts a lack of profitability due to the high cost of chemicals; however, this analysis does not consider the resulting protection of the hydrological environment. Field-scale studies should be conducted in future to prove the effectiveness of the model.

Real-Time Control Technology for a Bio-Liquor Circulation System in a Swine Barn with Slurry Pit: Pilot Scale Study

“…In 2018, 781 million hogs were raised globally and 11.2 million hogs were reared in South Korea [ 1 ]. The annual production of swine manure in South Korea exceeds 20.5 million tons, and accounts for 41% of the total domestic annual manure generation [ 2 ]. Manure has been used as a fertilizer for centuries and is regarded as a valuable resource for increasing soil productivity [ 3 , 4 ].…”

Heavy metals adsorption on struvite recovered from livestock wastewaters and release properties of granular forms

“…In the study of Muhmood et al (2018), 45% and 40% of Cu and Zn in the poultry slurry were transformed on struvite crystal, respectively, and they were incorporated into the struvite as phosphate (-PO 4 ) and hydroxide (-OH) phases combined with the metals (Wang et al, 2022). The adsorption amount of metals on struvite is dependent on the solution pH, initial metal concentration, organic matter, and competitive ions (Huang et al, 2019;Li et al, 2021;Ryu et al, 2020). In addition, Cu and Zn usually co-existed in the swine wastewater, making the precipitation processes more complicated, which might affect the elemental composition of crystals.…”

Application of Recycled Filling to Improve the Purification Performance of Confectionery Wastewater in a Vertical Anaerobic Labyrinth Flow Bioreactor

“…The binding of these pollutants in fermentation reactors only correlates with their accumulation in the biomass of the growing population of anaerobic microorganisms [22]. The efficiency of this process is very low, and only rarely reaches a level several dozen percentage points [23]. Another problem is the loss of anaerobic sludge, which leads to a decrease in the concentration of anaerobic microorganisms in the environment and determines the limitation of the final technological effects in terms of the efficiency of wastewater treatment and the efficiency of biogas production [24].…”