The second part is about the properties of activated sludge and their performance

indexes. First, let’s talk about the physical properties of activated sludge.
Activated sludge, we can also call it zoogloea, is a kind of biological
flocculation. It is usually tawny or earthy yellow. It has earthy smell. Specially,
when activated sludge method is used for wastewater treatment, then it will have
that earthy smell. Its proportion is slightly higher than water, and the particle
size is between 0.02~0.2 mm. Its specific surface area is also very large, usually
between 20-100 cm2/mL. The second is the composition of activated sludge. Water
makes up most of the activated sludge. The moisture content of the activated sludge
is usually between 99.2%-99.8%. Besides water, there are some solid matters in the
sludge. Its solid content is between 0.2%-0.8%. The solid matters consist of two
parts. One is organic matters, the other is inorganic matters. Usually we divide
the organic matters into three parts. The first is activity cells. We use Ma to
represent them. The second is residues of microbial endogenous respiration
metabolism. The third is some organic matters, which are difficult to degrade, in
the wastewater absorbed by the sludge. We use Me an Mi to represent these two parts
respectively. The inorganic matter is represented by Mii. The content of organic
matters in ordinary activated sludge is usually 75% to 85%. The third is the
microorganisms in the activated sludge. The microorganisms in the activated sludge
can be divided into two categories. One is bacteria, the other is protozoa or
metazoan which is obviously bigger than bacteria in size. The bacteria are the most
active microbes in the activity sludge, when it comes to the wastewater
purification. The main spawn includes moving coli, pseudomonas, micrococcus, yellow
bacillus, bacillus coli, producing alkali bacillus, and colorless bacillus, etc.
Their characteristic is that most of them are aerobic and facultative heterotrophic
prokaryotes. Under the condition of aerobic, they have strong ability to decompose
organic matters in wastewater. Their multiplication rate is very high. Their
generation time is generally about 20 to 30 min. Especially the moving coli in it
has the function to make other bacteria to get together to be zoogloea group. The
protozoons in the activity sludge are mainly paramecium, insect, amoeba, clock and
so on. They usually feed on tiny bacteria or wastewater organic particles. The
content of protozoons is about 1000 in per milliliter activated sludge. In activity
sludge, the metazoans include nematodes, rotifers and so on. They are higher level
multi-cellular animals than anhistozoa. They usually feed on native animals or
other microorganisms. The kind and amount of the native animals or metazoon in the
activity sludge are closely related with the operation of the activated sludge
system and the degree of wastewater treatment. So it is used as the biological
indicator of activity sludge. This figure shows that in the activity sludge system,
with the times goes on, when the concentration of the organic matter descends, when
different kinds of protozoons and metazoans appear, and how the amount of them
changes. We can see that as the time goes on and the quality in the wastewater
improves, the species of protozoons are successively meat millipede, giardia,
swimming infusorians, sessile ciliates to rotifer at last. After we introduce some
basic properties of activity sludge, let’s see the performance indexes of activity
sludge. The first performance index is the concentration of activated sludge.
Usually we call it MLSS. From this formula we can see that MLSS includes four kinds
of solid matters, which are the previous four solid matters, Ma，Me，M and Mii. The
second performance index is the mixture of volatile suspended solid concentration
(MLVSS). From this formula we can see that it actually includes three kinds of
organic substance in activity sludge, Ma，Me and Mi. When the condition is stable,
the ratio of MLVSS and MLSS, which is also the ratio of VSS and SS, is quite
stable. In the activity sludge system dealing with domestic wastewater, this value
is normally from 0.75 to 0.85. The third performance index is Sludge Volume (SV).
We can see from its English name that it means a volume of settled sludge. Its
definition is that after the mixture in the aeration tank is set still for 30 min.
The ratio of the volume of precipitation sludge and the original mixture expressed
in percentage is the SV. It could reflect the concentration of activated sludge or
the condensed or settling performance of the sludge. It can be used to control the
discharge amount of excess sludge and test the sludge in case it bulks. The normal
range of sludge settling ratio is from 20% to 30%. From this figure we can see that
if we get the mixture with a liter of measuring cylinder from the aeration tank,
after a certain time of sedimentation, the sludge will separate with the clear
liquid. After 30 minutes, we find the volume of settled sludge is 400 ml. It means
that de SV of sludge is 40%. The fourth performance index is sludge volume index,
short for SVI. Its definition is that after the mixture in the aeration tank is
settled for 30 min, the volume of wet sewage sludge formed by 1g dry sludge,
sometimes specially emphasis that 1g absolute dry sludge, whose unit is ml/g. The
relationship between SVI and SV can be shown with this formula. Compared with SV,
SVI can evaluate coagulation and sedimentation performance of sludge more
accurately. When its value is very low, it means the particles of sludge in the
activity sludge is quite small, and the sludge density is relatively large,
inorganic components may be high If this value is too high, that means its
sedimentation performance is poor, sludge bulking may happen or has already
happened. In the activity sludge system which treats the domestic wastewater, the
normal value of SVI is between 50 ml/g and 150 ml/g. The third part of this lesson
is about the basic process parameters of activated sludge. First let's start with
the organic loading volume in the aeration tank. the organic loading volume means
how much organic matters could unit cubic meter of the reactor volume in the
aeration tank affords in a day. It has different expressions. The first is from the
view of inflow water, which is called the water organic loading volume, which can
use COD or BOD5 to express. Here are different formulas. You can study them later.
Their units are kgCOD/m3.d and kgBOD5/m3.d The second is the removal volume load,
the formula of which is also expressed here. Actually it means the amount of COD or
BOD5 an cubic meter of the reactor volume in a day can afford or discharge. The
second technological parameter is the organic sludge load in the aeration tank. It
also can be divided into water sludge load and removed sludge load. Their
calculation formulas are like this. Their unit is kgCOD/kgMLSS.d. Or
kgBOD5/kgMLSS.d or kgBOD5/kgMLVSS.d. It means the amount of organic matters one
kilogram of sludge in the aeration tank can remove in a day, expressed with COD or
BOD5. the formula of the removed sludge load is also listed here. The unit is the
same with water sludge load. But we should know that kgCOD or kgBOD5 means the
amount of COD or BOD5 can be removed in the aeration tank in a day. The third is an
important technological parameter, the hydraulic retention time, HRT for short. The
easiest way to calculate it is the quotient of the volume of aeration tank and the
wastewater quantity that aeration tank deals with every day. At last we need to
convert the unit into hour. During the activated sludge process which is used
normally to deal with the wastewater in the city The HRT is usually between 6 h to
8 h, sometimes may be extended to 15 h The fourth technological parameter is the
sludge retention time in the aeration tank, which we call SRT. Sometimes we call it
sludge age. It means the average retention time that the activated sludge stays in
the aeration tank. Here we list the formula of SRT. We can see that the molecule is
V multiplied by X, which means the volume of sludge in the aeration tank. The △X
below means the daily growth of the sludge in the system. There is a very difficult
computational formula. The inflow water may bring a certain amount of microbes in,
and the effluent may also bring a certain amount of sludge out, If we can assume
that the amount of both two parts are very small, we can directly use the last
formula to calculate. That is the sludge volume in the aeration tank divided by the
discharge value. Xr means the sludge concentration of the returned sludge. The
relationship between Xr and SVI can be expressed by this formula. The Xr is
approximately equal to 10 to the power 6 devided by SVI. Its unit is mg/L. Why the
result is like this? You can think about it. Let's look at this flow chart. This
figure shows us quantity of every node of flow in the whole activated sludge
system, the amount of organic matters and the concentration of sludge. We can see
that in normal activated sludge process, secondary sedimentation tank is used to
settle the sludge and separate the sludge and water, in order to secure the final
effluent water quality. The process happens in the secondary sedimentation tank is
a dynamic precipitation process. The water mixture continuously enters the
secondary sedimentation tank. And the upper clear liquid is continuously discharged
as well. The return sludge continuously recycles. If we can assume that we have
conducted the process of the SVI test which means the 30 min static settlement in a
measuring cylinder, and its result of sedimentation is the same as the
sedimentation result in the secondary sedimentation tank, then we can see that the
relationship between its SVI and Xr is 10^6
divided by SVI. Then we can get the concentration of return sludge. That’s all for
the class.