Simultaneous treatment of graywater and waste gas in a biological trickling filter. Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • Biological processors are typically used in liquid- and gas-phase remediation as separately staged systems. This research presents a novel application of a biotrickling filter operated for simultaneous treatment of contaminants present in graywater and waste gas (ammonia and hydrogen sulfide). Liquid- and gas-phase contaminants were monitored via bioreactor influent/effluent samples over the course of a 300-day study. An oxygen-based bioassay was used to determine spatial location of the functional groups involved in the biodegradation of surfactants, dissolved hydrogen sulfide, and ammonium. Results indicated that a biotrickling filter is able to support the wide range of microbial species required to degrade the compounds found in graywater and waste gas, maintaining conversion efficiencies greater than 90% for parent surfactant compounds and waste gas constituents. These results provide evidence of an operational scheme that potentially reduces footprint size and cost of graywater/waste gas biotreatment.

published proceedings

  • Water Environ Res

author list (cited authors)

  • McLamore, E., Sharvelle, S., Huang, Z., & Banks, K.

citation count

  • 5

complete list of authors

  • McLamore, Eric||Sharvelle, Sybil||Huang, Zhen||Banks, Kathy

publication date

  • November 2008

publisher