Abstract
To understand the chemical structure of sewer sludge in comparison with commercial compost and charcoal used as a soil improver, it was carried out to analyse their ash contents and metal ions, and to elucidate the chemical structure of their residuals after a sequential treatment of alcohol-benzene(1:2) extraction in Soxhlet, 3% HCl reflux and 79% H₂SO₄ hydrolysis, using CHNS analyzer and solid C-13 NMR spectrometer. The results obtained were as follows: 1. Ash content of sludge was about 46% that is higher than those of compost (17%) and charcoal (4%). 2. The residual of sludge after a sequential treatment of HCl and H₂SO₄ hydrolyses had high ash content about 23%, too. 3. The sludge seems to be suitable to the soil improver because the content of heavy metal ions in sludge was near the compost and below the organic fertilizer standard. 4. Elemental composition of sludge residual after HCl-H₂SO₄ hydrolyes was C/sub 56/H/sub 91/O/sub 12/N₂S = (C/sub 6/H/sub 10/O/sub 5/)/sub 7/(C/sub 6/H₄)/sub 7/C₂H/sub 43/O₂N₂S, similar to C/sub 103/H/sub 122/O/sub 33/N/sub 6/S = (C/sub 6/H/sub 10/O/sub 5/)/sub 6/(C/sub 6/H₄)/sub 10/C/sub 7/H/sub 22/O₃N/sub 6/S of compost. 5. The sludge residual had proved to have both considerable aliphatic and aromatic groups, but the compost residual to have mainly aliphatic groups and the charcoal to have mainly aromatic groups, through the peak analysis of solid C-13 NMR charts. 6. So, the sewer sludge is proved to have a considerable amount of aromaticity like in woody biomass containing lignin.