Anammox reactor treating low strength domestic wastewater: a review

Abstract

Abstract Anaerobic ammonia oxidation (anammox) is a promising biological wastewater treatment process. It has been widely implemented in many industries due to lower oxygen consumptions besides being an environmental friendly method for wastewater treatment. However, there are several challenges in the process for potential application such as low anammox bacterial abundance and slow growth rate that lower the efficiency of the reaction. Therefore, several factors are being considered during operation of the anammox process. There are various anammox bacteria, which may be enriched using special techniques. Lower nitrogen content of influent brings great challenges for anammox performance due to inhibition caused by ammonium-oxidizing bacteria (AOB) and nitrite oxidizing bacteria (NOB) in nitrification process. This review highlighted the anammox process in various industry as well their anammox bacteria morphology, mechanism and strategies to enrich the bacteria. Coupled anammox process with low strength domestic wastewater requires more research to enable potential application in wastewater treatment.