Author(s)

Ali Ibrah Landi^1,2*, Jun Lu²

¹Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science and Technique, Dan Dicko Dankoulodo University of Maradi (UDDM), Maradi, Niger.
²College of Resources and Environmental Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology (ECUST), Shanghai, China.

The effects of aeration rates and aeration patterns on the oxidation of ammonia-nitrogen into nitrite were investigated. The influent high ammonia-nitrogen synthetic wastewater resembled to those of the catalytic process of the petrochemical refinery. The method involved the biological shortcut nitrification and denitrification lab-scale’s sequencing batch reactor (SBR) process based on intermittent aerations and aeration patterns. All the operations were carried out in a 20 L working volume SBR bioreactor, and the influent synthetic wastewater’s concentration was always 1000 mg/L ammonia-nitrogen NH₄-N concentration at a C/N (carbon/nitrogen) ratio of 2.5:1. Effective shortcut nitrification to nitrite was registered at 1.1 mg-O₂/L (i.e. 9 L-air/min) with 99.1% nitrification efficiency, 99.0% nitritation rate and 2.6 mg-NO₃^--N/L nitrate concentration. The best results with 99.3% nitrification efficiency were recorded when operating at 1.4 mg-O₂/L (i.e. 12 L-air/min). According to these experiments, it results that the nitrite accumulation rate was related to aeration rate and cycle’s duration. However, at 1.7 mg-O₂/L (i.e. 15 L-air/min), the system was limited by an increase in nitrate concentration with more than 5 mg/L which could be a point of reverse to conventional nitrification. The best total nitrogen (TN) removal was about 71.5%.

Wastewater Treatment, SBR, Partial Nitrification/Denitrification, Intermittent Aeration, Aeration Rate, Aeration Pattern, Total Nitrogen (TN) Removal

Landi, A. and Lu, J. (2022) Effects of Aeration Rates and Patterns on Shortcut Nitrification and Denitrification. Journal of Environmental Protection, 13, 640-656. doi: 10.4236/jep.2022.139041.