Minimization of activated sludge production by chemically stimulated energy spilling

Abstract

Minimization of excess sludge production in activated sludge processes has been pursued around the world in order to meet stringent environmental regulations on sludge treatment and disposal. To achieve this goal, physical, chemical, and biological approaches have been proposed. In this paper, a chemical compound, 3,3′,4′,5-tetrachlorosalicylanilide (TCS) was tested for enhancing microbial energy spilling of the sludgeso as to minimize its growth. In order to examine this, an exploratory study was conducted using both batch and continuous activated sludge cultures. Batch experiments with these two cultures were carried out at different initial concentrations of TCS. It has been confirmed that an addition of TCS is effective in reducing the production of both the sludge cultures, particularly the continuous culture where the observed growth yield was reduced by around 70%, when the initial TCS concentration was 0.8 ppm. Meanwhile, the substrate removal activity of this culture was found not to be affected at this TCS concentration. To further evaluate the TCS effect, a pure microbial culture of E. coli was employed. Batch experiment results with this culture implied that TCS might be able to reduce the cell density of E. coli drastically when an initial TCS concentration was greater than 0.12 ppm. It was also found that TCS was not toxic to this type of bacteria. Microscopic examinations with a 4′, 6-diamidino-2-phenylindole (DAPI) staining technique revealed that TCS neither affected the cell division nor altered the cell size of E. coli. However, both the cell ATP content and the cell dry weight were reduced significantly with the addition of TCS.