The Future of Effluent Treatment Plants

Book excerpt: The Future of Effluent Treatment Plants: Biological Treatment Systems is an advanced and updated version of the existing biological technologies with their limitations and challenges and their potential application to remove chemical oxygen demand (COD), refractory chemical oxygen demand, biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), colour removal and environmental pollutants through the advancements in microbial bioremediation. It also introduces the new trends and advances in environmental bioremediation with thorough discussions of the recent developments in this field by the application of bioengineering and environmental biotechnology. The book illustrates that that the application of these new emerging innovative technologies lead to energy saving and resource recovery. The importance of respiration, nitrogen mineralization, nitrification, denitrification and biological phosphorus removal processes in the development of a fruitful and applicable solution for the removal of toxic pollutants from wastewater treatment plants is highlighted. Equally important is the knowledge and theoretical modelling of water movement through the wastewater ecosystems. The understanding of the contact between the microbes and wastewater is a prerequisite for the kinetic modelling of various enzyme reactions to describe the water purification process. Emphasis is given to the function of constructed wetlands and activated sludge processes.