Biofiltration Polishing of Ozone Treated Secondary Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant Effluent Michael James Reaume University of Windsor
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University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor Electronic Theses and Dissertations 2012 Biofiltration Polishing of Ozone Treated Secondary Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant Effluent Michael James Reaume University of Windsor Follow this and additional works at: http://scholar.uwindsor.ca/etd Recommended Citation Reaume, Michael James, "Biofiltration Polishing of Ozone Treated Secondary Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant Effluent" (2012). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. Paper 5375. This online database contains the full-text of PhD dissertations and Masters’ theses of University of Windsor students from 1954 forward. These documents are made available for personal study and research purposes only, in accordance with the Canadian Copyright Act and the Creative Commons license—CC BY-NC-ND (Attribution, Non-Commercial, No Derivative Works). 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Biofiltration Polishing of Ozone Treated Secondary Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant Effluent by Michael Reaume A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies through Environmental Engineering in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Applied Science at the University of Windsor Windsor, Ontario, Canada 2012 © 2012 Michael Reaume Biofiltration Polishing of Ozone Treated Secondary Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant Effluent by Michael Reaume APPROVED BY: ______________________________________________ Dr. Andrew Hubberstey Department of Biological Sciences ______________________________________________ Dr. Edwin Tam Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering ______________________________________________ Dr. Rajesh Seth, Advisor Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering ______________________________________________ Dr. Xiaohong Xu, Chair of Defense Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering January 7, 2013 DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY I hereby certify that I am the sole author of this thesis and that no part of this thesis has been published or submitted for publication. I certify that, to the best of my knowledge, my thesis does not infringe upon anyone’s copyright nor violate any proprietary rights and that any ideas, techniques, quotations, or any other material from the work of other people included in my thesis, published or otherwise, are fully acknowledged in accordance with the standard referencing practices. Furthermore, to the extent that I have included copyrighted material that surpasses the bounds of fair dealing within the meaning of the Canada Copyright Act, I certify that I have obtained a written permission from the copyright owner(s) to include such material(s) in my thesis and have included copies of such copyright clearances to my appendix. I declare that this is a true copy of my thesis, including any final revisions, as approved by my thesis committee and the Graduate Studies office, and that this thesis has not been submitted for a higher degree to any other University or Institution. iii ABSTRACT Ozone has been shown to be very effective in the transformation of several CECs that escape the wastewater treatment process, but there is concern whether toxic transformation products are formed. Two parallel biofilter columns with granular activated carbon (GAC) and filter sand following a pilot scale ozone unit to treat secondary municipal wastewater treatment plant effluent were studied. The biologically activated carbon (BAC) biofilter outperformed the sand biofilter in terms of DOC, DO and UV 254 removal. In addition, GAC supported more biological activity than sand media. Genotoxicity results show reduced wastewater genotoxicity following ozonation and further reduction following BAC and sand biofiltration. However, bacterial re-growth did occur in both biofilters following ozonation and needs to be taken into consideration when implementing ozone-biofiltration units. iv DEDICATION To my parents. Without their support, I would not have been able to continue my education. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The author wishes to thank Dr. Rajesh Seth for his availability, advice and guidance throughout the research and writing of this thesis. I am thankful to Saileshkumar Singh for teaching me how to run the ozone pilot unit, for his help and suggestions to design the biofilter pilot units and for guidance in the laboratory. I am also thankful to Dr. Kerry McPhedran for his help and suggestions while performing toxicity testing, solid phase extractions and for helping to edit my thesis. Furthermore, thanks to Dr. Elizabeth Fidalgo da Silva for her effort and suggestions with the E-SCREEN. Unfortunately the E-SCREEN did not materialize, but I am very thankful for getting the chance to work with Dr. Fidalgo da Silva. I am thankful to our lab technicians, Bill Middleton and Matt St. Louis. Bill Middleton provided support and suggestions while performing laboratory analysis. Matt St. Louis assisted in fabricating the biofilter pilot units. The plant manager and the staff at the Little River Pollution Control Plant are thankfully acknowledged for providing a place to set up the pilot units and support throughout the study. Calgon Carbon Corporation is also acknowledged for donating the GAC used in one of the pilot scale biofilters. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY .......................................................................................... iii ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................................... iv DEDICATION ................................................................................................................................ v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................... vi LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................................................... xii LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................................. xiv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS .................................................................................................. xvi CHAPTER 1 ................................................................................................................................... 1 1.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Background ...................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 Overall Objective ............................................................................................................. 4 1.3 Specific Objectives ........................................................................................................... 5 1.4 Organization of Thesis ..................................................................................................... 5 CHAPTER 2 ................................................................................................................................... 7 2.0 REVIEW OF LITERATURE .............................................................................................. 7 2.1 Concerns with Municipal Wastewater Discharge ............................................................ 7 2.2 Treatment Process Units for CEC & Toxicity Removal .................................................. 9 2.3 Ozone ............................................................................................................................. 12 2.3.1 Ozone Generation & Configuration ........................................................................ 12 2.3.2 Ozone Oxidation Mechanisms on Organic Matter (OM) ....................................... 12 2.3.3 Role of Ozone in WWT .......................................................................................... 13 2.3.4 Ozone Transformation By-Products (TPs) ............................................................. 14 2.4 Biofiltration .................................................................................................................... 16 2.4.1 Role of Biofilters in WWT ..................................................................................... 16 2.4.2 Biofilter Configuration............................................................................................ 16 2.4.3 Biofiltration Mechanisms to Remove OM .............................................................. 17 2.4.3.1 Biodegradable & Refractory OM .................................................................... 17 2.4.3.2 Biofiltration Mechanisms to Remove OM: Media Type ................................. 18 2.4.4 Biofilter Backwashing ............................................................................................ 20 2.5 Biofilter Performance Monitoring .................................................................................. 21 2.5.1 Total Organic Carbon (TOC)/Dissolved Organic Carbon (DOC) .......................... 21 2.5.2 UV 254 ......................................................................................................................