• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.36 no.11
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• pp.758-763
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• 2014

Soil microbial fuel cells (SMFC) have gained a great attention as an eco-friendly technology that can simultaneously generate electricity and treat organic pollutants from the contaminated soil. We evaluated the effect of electrode spacing and size on the performance of SMFC treating soil contaminated with organic pollutants. Maximum power density decreased with increase in electrode distance or decrease in electrode size, likely due to higher internal resistance. The maximum voltage and power density decreased from 326 mV and $19.5mW/m^2$ with 4 cm of electrode distance to 222 mV and $5.9mW/m^2$ with 9 cm of electrode distance. In case of electrode size test, the maximum voltage and power density generated was 291 mV, $0.34mW/m^3$ when both of anode and cathode area were $64cm^2$ with 4 cm of electrode distance. The maximum voltage decreased by 19~29% when the anode area decreased to $16cm^2$ while only 3~12% of voltage decreased with cathode area decrease. The maximum power density decreased by 49~68% with decreasing anode size, and by 29~47% with decreasing cathode size. These results showed that the anode area had more significant effects than the cathode area on the power generation of SMFC which has a high internal resistance due to a coexistence of soil and wastewater in the reactor.

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.41-48
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• 2017

A vertical multi-stage ammonia stripping reactor using E-PFR, which has been proved to be superior in anaerobic and aerobic treatment, was developed and a lab scale experiment was conducted. According to the change of stage number condition, the removal rate of the ammonia nitrogen in the reactor with 0-stage was about 52.5% after 8 hours (pH 10, temperature $35^{\circ}C$, and the air/liquid ratio $3min^{-1}$) However, in the reactor with 5-stage, the removal efficiency was about 62.6%. According to the change of pH condition, the removal rate of ammonia nitrogen was about 42.6% at pH 9 after 8 hours, and was about 74.4% at pH 11 (5-stage reactor, temperature $35^{\circ}C$, and the air/liquid ratio $3min^{-1}$). According to the change of temperature condition, the removal rate of the ammonia nitrogen was about 51% at $25^{\circ}C$ after 8 hours (5-stage reactor, pH 10, and the air/liquid ratio $3min^{-1}$), and was about 87.2% at $45^{\circ}C$. According to the change of air injection volume condition, the removal rate of the ammonia nitrogen was about 45.8% at $2min^{-1}$ after 8 hours (5-stage reactor, pH 10, and at $35^{\circ}C$). and was about 75% at $4min^{-1}$. Based on these results, we will follow up the applicability of the actual plant in the future through continuous operation evaluation.

• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.431-440
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• 2014

To propose the improvement and management plans to strengthen the pollutant removal efficiency of dam reservoir's constructed wetlands(CWs), the operation status and configuration of CWs (including water depth, operational flow, water flow distribution, residence time, and pollutant removal efficiency, aspect ratio, open water/vegetation ratio etc.) were analyzed in 10 major wetlands constructed in dam reservoirs. The pollutant concentrations in the inflows of the studied CWs were lower than those of American and European constructed wetlands. Especially, organic matter concentrations in all of inflows were below 3 mg/L(as BOD) due to advanced treatment of sewage disposal plant and an intake of low concentration water during dry and normal seasons. The average removal efficiency of total nitrogen(TN) and total phosphorus(TP) for 10 CWs ranged from 7.6~67.6%(mean 24.9%) and -4.9~74.5%(mean 23.7%), respectively, showing high in wetlands treating municipal wastewater. On the other hand, the removal efficiency of BOD was generally low or negative with ranging from -133.3 to 41.7%. From the analysis of the operation status and configuration of CWs, it is suggested that the low removal efficiency of dam reservoir's CWs were caused by both structural (inappropriate aspect ratio, excessive open water area) and operational (neglecting water-level management, lack of facilities and operation for first flush treatment, lake of monitoring during rainy events) problems. Therefore, to enable to play a role as a reduction facility of non-point source(NPS) pollutants, an appropriate design and operation manuals for dam reservoir's CW is urgently needed. In addition, the monitoring during rainy events, when NPS runoff occur, must be included in operation manual of CW, and then the data obtained from the monitoring is considered in estimation of the pollutant removal efficiency by dam reservoir's CW.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.43-71
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• 1999

This research is an experimental work of developing a construction material using municipal wastewater sludge as liner and cover materials for waste disposal landfill. Weathered granite soil and flyash, produced as a by-product in the power plant, were used as the primary additives to improve geotechnical engineering properties of sludge. For secondary additives, bentonite and cement were mixed with sludge to decrease the permeability and to increase the shear strength, respectively. Various laboratory test required to evaluate the design criteria for liner and cover materials, were carried out by changing the mixing ratio of sludge with the additives. Basic soil properties such as specific gravity, grain size distribution, liquid and plastic limits were measured to analyze their effects on permeability, compaction, compressibility and shear strength properties of mixtures. Laboratory compaction tests were conducted to find the maximum dry densities and the optimum moisture contents of mixtures, and their effectiveness of compaction in field was consequently evaluated. Permeability tests of variable heads with compacted samples, and the stress-controlled consolidation tests with measuring permeabilities of samples during consolidation process were performed to obtain permeability, and to find the compressibility as well as consolidational coefficients of mixtures, respectively. To evaluate the long term stability of sludges, creep tests were also conducted in parallel with permeability tests of variable heads. On the other hand, for the compacted sludge decomposed for a month, permeability tests were carried out to investigate the effect of decomposition of organic matters in sludges on its permeability. Direct shear tests were performed to evaluate the shear strength parameters of mixed sludge with weathered granite, flyash and bentonite. For the mixture of sludge with cement, unconfined compression tests were carried out to find their strength with varying mixing ratio and curing time. On the other hand, CBR tests for compacted specimen were also conducted to evaluate the trafficability of mixtures. Various test results with mixtures were assessed to evaluate whether their properties meet the requirements as liner and cover materials in waste disposal landfill.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.22 no.6
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• pp.1093-1101
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• 2000

The object of this study was to develop new BNR process using fixed-biofilm which could be applied to retrofit the existing wastewater treatment plant or to introduce as tertiary treatment plant. To achieve complete denitrification from typical raw sewage in Korea, external carbon source must be supplied because $SCOD_{cr}/T-N(NH_4{^+}-N+NOx-N)$of raw sewage was lower than other countries. In this study, the ratio of $SCOD_{cr}/NH_4{^+}-N$ was 2.49 and the influent $NH_4{^+}$-N concentration during the experimental period was varied from 25 to 37 mg/L. To enhance nitrogen removal from the sewage, the two processes using fixed biofilm were adopted as R-Hanoxic/mid.settler/aerobic/anoxic/ aerobic) and R-2(aerobic/mid.settlerlanoxic/anoxic/aerobic), respectively. In the comparison of $NH_4{^+}$-N, T-N effluent quality and T-N removal efficiency in both processes without external carbon source, R-1 process was better than R-2 process for nitrogen removal from raw sewage. With respect to $SCOD_{cr}$/NOx-N ratio and total nitrogen removal in each anoxic reactor of two processes, R-1's was more effective than R-2's for distributing organic matters of raw sewage. In the both processes using fixed biofilm, the amount of required alkalinity to remove unit $NH_4{^+}$-N were 5.18 and 5.76($g{\cdot}CaCO_3/g{\cdot}NH_4{^+}-N_{removed}$), respectively and were lower than activated sludge BNR process(7.14).