Operational analysis rotating biological contactor -activated sludge or nitrifiying trickling filte-activated sludge?

Talaeian, Mohamad; Mirnemati, Maryam

doi:10.22050/ijogst.2025.522758.1740

Operational analysis rotating biological contactor -activated sludge or nitrifiying trickling filte-activated sludge?

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

mohamad talaeian ¹

maryam mirnemati ²

¹ Assistant Professor, Department of Environment, University of Environment, Karaj, Iran

² PhD Student, Department of Chemical Engineering, Abadan Faculty of Petroleum, Petroleum University of Technology, Abadan, Iran

https://doi.org/10.22050/ijogst.2025.522758.1740

Abstract

Municipal and industrial wastewater pose significant environmental hazards if discharged without adequate treatment. Consequently, appropriate treatment processes must be implemented prior to discharge into receiving water bodies, land application, or reuse. Ensuring access to clean water remains a critical global priority. This study aims to contribute to the development of an efficient wastewater treatment plant. The application of process simulation and modeling plays a crucial role in the design, construction, and prediction of operational requirements for wastewater treatment facilities. Simulating a project before full-scale implementation can reduce capital and operational expenditures while enabling comprehensive technical evaluation from multiple perspectives. This study proposes the implementation of a combined nitrifying trickling filter/activated sludge (NTF/AS) process to upgrade a municipal wastewater treatment plant (MWWTP). The performance of the MWWTP was analyzed and compared for two configurations: a combined rotating biological contactor/activated sludge (RBC/AS) process and a combined NTF/AS process. Two treatment scenarios were developed and technically evaluated using operational data from the Ekbatan wastewater treatment plant in Tehran. In these simulations, GPS-X software was employed to investigate the effects of variations in influent characteristics within their minimum and maximum ranges on effluent quality. Considering the variability in influent conditions resulted in more accurate and reliable predictions. Under the fixed-flow scenario, the RBC/AS configuration achieved removal efficiencies of 90.51%, 89.70%, 95.14%, 14.80%, and 76.41% for chemical oxygen demand, total suspended solids, biochemical oxygen demand BOD5, total phosphorus, and ammonia, respectively.

Highlights

· This study evaluated the effectiveness of two distinct wastewater treatment plant configurations in terms of their ability to produce high-quality effluent.

· The evaluation was conducted using GPS-X software, specifically the September 2007 (USA, Avg) version.

· The NTF/AS process achieved higher removal efficiencies for biochemical oxygen demand, chemical oxygen demand, and total suspended solids than the RBC/AS configuration.

· With respect to total phosphate removal, the nitrifying trickling filter/activated sludge process demonstrated a removal efficiency comparable to that of the RBC/AS configuration.

· The NTF/AS-based municipal wastewater treatment plant represents a financially viable option.

Keywords

Activated sludge

Nitrifying trickling filter

Operational analysis

Rotating biological contactor

Wastewater treatment plant

Subjects

Environmental Engineering

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