Simultaneous nitrification and denitrification in the activated sludge systems of continuous flow

This study has investigated the biological nitrogen removal by simultaneous nitrification and denitrification (SND) processes in a system of continuous flow activated sludge (AS) process. The investigation had four stages and evaluated the system behavior under different solid retention times (SRT), food-to-mass (F/M) ratios and dissolved oxygen (DO) concentrations. The data showed that the concentration of DO 0.5±0.2 mgO2/L did not affect the growth of heterotrophic bacteria (2.2–3.1 d−1 at 20°C) and autotrophic nitrifying bacteria (0.16–1.94 d−1 at 20°C), resulting in values very close to those obtained in conventional AS processes. The chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal was over 90% in all stages. The decrease in SRT from 37.2 to 27.8, 19.0 and 10.0 days had no significant influence on the development of SND. In the stage where the carbon/nitrogen (C/N) ratio was 4.3 mgCOD/mgN L, SND efficiency was of 55%. In the following stages, the C/N ratio was increased and it was possible to achieve efficiencies higher than 98% SND. Overall, the data showed that appropriate controls of carbon and nitrogen input are required to achieve an efficient SND. An established SND technology can save operation time and energy, and might replace the traditional two stages: biological nitrification and denitrification process.