Investigation of nitrification characteristics of a nitrogenous industrial wastewater

Abstract

Treatment of wastewaters containing very high amounts of nitrogen is a problem forindustries like the fertilizer industry. Up to date methods like air stripping or ion exchangecan also be used in removal of nitrogen but they have certain disadvantages.The main purpose of this thesis was to present another known process used in nitrogenremoval. The general concern of the study is to determine if nitrification process couldtolerate industrial wastewaters containing high concentrations of nitrogen.In the beginning of the experimental part of the study, sludge previously acclimated tonitrification was introduced to increasing concentrations of ammonium nitrogen. In thesecond part of the study, wastewater from a fertilizer industry was used in order to detectthe removal capacity of the system. Throughout the study effects of pH on the system andthe system's tolerance was observed. Data obtained during the study proved thatnitrification is a process that behaves according to the zero order kinetics. Finally, the resultsindicated that a nitrification process can surmount very high amounts of nitrogen if theenvironmental conditions are idealized.