• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.53-63
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• 2018

The hydrolysis of organic solid waste, such as sludge, is the rate-limiting step of the anaerobic digestion. The longer rate-limiting step lead to decrease of treatment efficiency and increase hydraulic retention time and anaerobic digester. Therefore, the pre-treatment has been applied for accelerating the hydrolysis step. This study was investigated the effects of pre-treatment of waste activated sludge using ultrasonic and alkaline integrated treatment simultaneously. The results showed the cumulative methane production and the methane production rate increased while the lag phase decreased. Therefore ultrasonic and alkaline integrated pre-treatment of waste activated sludge resulted in acceleration of hydrolysis step in anaerobic digestion.

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.71-81
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• 2005

Anaerobic digestion is employed worldwide as the oldest and most important process for sludge stabilization. An additional advantage is the production of methane during anaerobic digestion. However, the waste activated sludge(WAS) has poor anaerobic degradability and less gas production due to the cell wall of bio-solid. In order to improve and enhance stabilization and dewatering of the WAS, a number of pretreatment processes have been developed and investigated. In this research, a pilot-scale study of pulse power pretreatment was performed to improve anaerobic degradability and dewaterability of the WAS. A pilot plant was designed and operated based on a previous laboratory study. Change of the sludge characteristics by pulse power pretreatment was estimated to assess the increasing soluble organics. The increased soluble organics could be used as a good substrate in the anaerobic digesion process. Gas production and methane potential of the anaerobic digestion were estimated as the parameters of anaerobic degradability. For evaluation of the dewaterability of pretreated WAS, capillary suction time(CST) and specific resistance were measured. The efficiency of energy recovery was also estimated by calculating energy balance.

• Proceedings of the Korean Environmental Sciences Society Conference
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• 1999.04a
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• pp.249-250
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• 1999

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.53 no.3
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• pp.200-207
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• 2017

A new approach to the solubilization of waste activated sludge (WAS) using alginate-quaternary ammonium complex beads was investigated under controlled mild alkaline conditions. The complex beads were prepared by the reaction of sodium alginate (SA) with 3-(trimethoxysilyl)propyl-octadecyldimethylammonium chloride (TSA) in acid solution, followed by crosslinking with $CaCl_2$. Treatment of WAS with SA-TSA complex beads was effective for enhancing the efficacy of WAS solubilization. The highest value of soluble chemical oxygen demand (SCOD) concentration (3,900 mg/L) was achieved after 10 days of treatment with 30% (v/v) SA-TSA complex beads. The WAS solubilization efficacy of the complex beads was also evaluated by estimating the concentrations of volatile fatty acids (VFAs). The maximum value of VFAs was 2,961 mg/L, and the overall proportions of VFAs were more than 75% of SCOD. The main components of VFAs were acetic, propionic, iso-butyric, and butyric acids. These results suggest that SA-TSA complex beads might be useful for enhancing the solubilization of WAS. The potential use of VFAs as the external carbon substrate for the production of polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) by a mixed microbial culture (MMC) was also examined. The enrichment of PHA-accumulating MMC could be achieved by periodic feeding of VFAs generated from WAS in a sequencing batch reactor. The composition of PHA synthesized from VFAs mainly consisted of 3-hydroxybutyrate. The maximum PHA content accounted for 25.9% of dry cell weight. PHA production by this process is considered to be promising since it has a doubly beneficial effect on the environment by reducing the amount of WAS and concomitantly producing an eco-friendly biopolymer.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.21 no.5
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• pp.551-558
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• 2007

From the view point of biological wastewater treatment, C/N ratio is one of the most important factor in biological nutrient removal process. However, municipal sewage in Korea is characterized by extremely low content of carbon source and relatively higher portion of N source. Accordingly, it is necessary to dose external carbon source in order to obtain higher degree of carbon source within the process. In this study, the effects of pH pretreatment as an alternative plan for increasing carbon source on the cell disruption and COD solubility of waste activated sludge were conducted under well defined experimental conditions. During 5 hours, the value of COD solubilization rate ($S_R$) at pH 11.5 is approximately 4.4 times higher than the value of $S_R$ at pH 9.5. It is expected that the level of SCOD increased due to the result from cell disruption. However, VSS/TSS ratio was not significantly changed after 5 hours. As Alkalinity changes gradually from less than 15, 30 and 60 meq NaOH/L, average RBCOD/SCOD fraction showed 34, 36 and 45%,respectively.

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.53-61
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• 2018

Anaerobic digestion (AD) is one of the most widely used process that can convert the organic fraction of waste activated sludge (WAS) into biogas. However, most researched actual methane yields of anaerobic digester (AD) on lab scale is lower than theoretical ones. Bioelectrochemical, anaerobic digester was used to increase methane yield from waste activated sludge. The influence of anaerobic digestion sludge and raw sludge mixing ratio (3:7, 5:5) on methane yield and organic matter removal efficiency were explored. As a result, when the mixing ratio of bioelectrochemical anaerobic sludge was 5:5 compared with 3:7, the highest methane yields were 294.2 mL $CH_4/L$ (0.63 times increase) and 52.5% (7.5% increase), the bioelectrochemical anaerobic digester(5:5) was more stable in the pH, t otal alkalinity and VFAs, respectively. These results showed that the increase in the mixing ratio of anaerobic digestion sludge was found to be effective for maintaining the stable performance of bioelectrochemical anaerobic digester.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.31-44
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• 1985

The application of anaerobic attached microbial films in the expanded bed process has recently been examined at high temperatures ($55^{\circ}C$) and with particulate matter. Extrapolation of the kinetics suggested that waste activated sludge (WAS) could be efficiently digested at hydraulic retention times as short as six hours in the expanded bed process. This would represent a 99 percent digester reactor volume reduction and would introduce interesting solids management alternatives if such a high rate process were developed. This paper presents a summary of a 1.5 year study of the feasibility of such a process. Three continuously fed $55^{\circ}C$ laboratory reactor systems were used to define the kinetics and the site of reactions-control completely mixed reactors were compared to the expanded beds (AAFEB) with and without a hydrolysis unit preceding the attached film unit. Well defined laboratory-generated WAS was compared to actual WAS from a domestic sewage treatment facility. Sixty percent of the biodegradable organics were converted in an AAFEB at a 15-hour hydraulic retention time without hydrolysis, whereas greater than 95 perccent of the biodegradable organics were stabilized in a two-stage system consisting of a 3-day HRT hydrolysis reactor followed by a 15-hour HRT AAFEB. The limitations of this high rate process and its potential application are discussed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Resources Recycling Conference
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• 2001.05a
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• pp.287-290
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• 2001

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.703-712
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• 2010

This study performed to extract operation factors of major organic wastes, which were food wastes and waste activated sludge generated in industries in order to use them as a substrate for bio-H2 production. According to the results of experimental analysis for hydrogen production capacity by various organic concentrations, the hydrogen production yield was the highest at 80 g/L, and the efficiency was improved by the pretreatment of waste activated sludge (acid treatment, alkali treatment). Hydrogen production efficiency was improved by mixing food wastes and waste activated sludge if waste activated sludge was below than 30%, however, it was decreased when it was more than 50%. The impacts of heavy metals on the hydrogen production shows that the inhibition level depends on the concentration of Cr, Zn, and Cu, Fe was able to enhance the hydrogen production.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.264-270
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• 2010

Waste activated sludge from sewage treatment plants mainly consisted of flocs of bacterial cell, and thus hard to be stabilized anaerobically due to rigid cell walls. One of the pretreatment methods to overcome this barrier is the venturi cavitation system (VCS) adopting hydrodynamic cavitation. This research was conducted to investigate the effects of the pretreatment of waste activated sludge by VCS on the anaerobic digestibility. Depending on the pretreatment period with the VCS, methane production, COD removal and VS removal efficiency increased 41%~45%, 36.5%~43.1% and 18.4~24.1%, respectively, compared to the control case. The increase in methane production from digester was 3.3~4.2 times higher than the theoretical methane potential of the increased SCOD after the VCS pre-treatment. This suggests that the VCS pre-treatment not only increases SCOD but also improves the digestibility of solid fractions. The energy mass balance indicated that the energy consumed for sludge pre-treatment could be recovered by the increased methane production after pre-treatment, suggesting the high potential for field application.