Author(s)

S. R. M. Kutty, F. E. W. Winarto, S. I. U. Gilani, A. A. Anizam, W. W. Z. Karimah & M. H. Isa

Abstract

. In most biological wastewater treatment systems, aeration is provided using millimetre diffusers of various sizes. The aeration is to provide mixing, as well as oxygen, for the microorganisms in the degradation of organic matter. In this study, the effectiveness of using micro diffusers in the degradation of organic matter was evaluated. Two reactors A and B, of size 140x140x500 mm, were constructed using Perspex to treat municipal wastewater. Aeration in reactors A and B was provided using a millimetre diffuser and a micro diffuser, respectively. The diffusers consist of perforated aluminium plate to generate millimetre bubbles and sintered porous glass to generate micro bubbles. Compressed air was forced through two parallel flow meters at a flow rate of 2.5 L/min. Biomass for both reactors were acclimatized prior to treating the municipal wastewater in the reactors. Two batch experiments were conducted at 26°C for the estimation of the kinetic parameters for the degradation of organic matter. Samples were evaluated for chemical oxygen demand (COD) and soluble chemical oxygen demand (sCOD) for both reactors at approximately 1 hour, 3 hours, and 6 hours, respectively, until 48 hours, for each batch of experiment. From the results of the study, it was found that for the micro and millimetre diffusers, the degradation kinetic parameter kCOD was 0.041 and 0.028, respectively, for COD and ksCOD was 0.060 and 0.044, respectively, for sCOD. On average, the micro and millimetre diffusers removed COD at approximately 87% and 81%, respectively, and removed sCOD at approximately 91% and 75%, respectively. It can be concluded that the use of a micro diffuser can provide a higher degradation of organic matter.

Keywords

micro air bubbles, COD, sCOD, DO, kinetics evaluation