Effect of deflocculation on the efficiency of sludge reduction by Fenton process.

Amudha, V.; Kavitha, S.; Fernandez, C.; Adishkumar, S.; Banu, J. Rajesh

Abstract

A novel approach to improve the efficiency of Fenton treatment for sludge reduction through the implication of a deflocculating agent citric acid, for the exclusion of extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) from waste-activated sludge (WAS), was investigated. Deflocculation was achieved with 0.06 g/g suspended solids (SS) of citric acid dosage. Fenton optimization studies using response surface methodology (RSM) revealed that 0.5 and 0.0055 g/g SS were the optimal dosages of H2O2 and Fe2+. The addition of a cation-binding agent set the pH value of sludge to 5 which did not affect the Fenton efficiency. The results presented in this study shows the advantage of deflocculating the sludge as SS and volatile suspended solids (VSS) reductions were found to be higher in the deflocculated (53 and 63 %, respectively) than in the flocculated (22 and 34 %, respectively) sludges. Kinetic investigation of the treatment showed that the rate of the reaction was four times higher in the deflocculated sludge than control. The methodology reported in this manuscript was successfully applied to a real case were the deflocculated mediated Fenton process reduced the sludge disposal cost from 297.8 to 61.9 US dollars/ton of sludge.

Citation

AMUDHA, V., KAVITHA, S., FERNANDEZ, C., ADISHKUMAR, S. and RAJESH BANU, J. 2016. Effect of deflocculation on the efficiency of sludge reduction by Fenton process. Environmental science and pollution research [online], 23(19), pages 19281-19291. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-016-7118-y

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jun 20, 2016
• Online Publication Date: Jun 30, 2016
• Publication Date: Oct 1, 2016
• Deposit Date: Jul 7, 2016
• Publicly Available Date: Jul 1, 2017
• Journal: Environmental science and pollution research
• Print ISSN: 0944-1344
• Electronic ISSN: 1614-7499
• Publisher: Springer
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 23
• Issue: 19
• Pages: 19281-19291
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-016-7118-y
• Keywords: Wasteactivated sludge; Extrapolymeric substances; Citric acid; Deflocculation; Fenton reaction; Sludge reduction
• Public URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10059/1529