Sequencing batch reactor technology for biological wastewater treatment: ...

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Special Theme Review

Sequencing batch reactor technology for biological wastewater treatment: a review

Mohini Singh, R. K. Srivastava Article first published online: 31 AUG 2010 DOI: 10.1002/apj.490
Copyright 2010 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Issue Asia-Pacific Journal of Chemical Engineering Special Issue: Festschrift in Honor of Professor Nabil Esmail Volume 6, Issue 1, pages 313, January/February 2011

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Get PDF (226K) Keywords: SBR; nutrient removal; granulation; SBBR; ASBR; GAC-SBR

Abstract

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Wastewater treatment has been a challenge throughout the years due to varying influent characteristics and stringent effluent regulations. In response to this dilemma, a reliable, cost-effective and high-efficiency sequencing batch reactor (SBR) technology has been recently developed. SBRs are variations of the activated sludge process that operates on a fill-and-draw basis. It combines both aerobicanaerobic phases in one unit and saves up to 25% of the aeration costs concomitant with low sludge production. Consequently, simultaneous nitrogen and phosphorus removal from the wastewater could be achieved by adjusting the actual operating cycle. This review paper discusses the technical description and operational flexibility of SBR for the treatment of wide range of effluent under different operational conditions, together with its modifications that could increase the effectiveness of SBR systems in the future. Copyright 2010 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

INTRODUCTION

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During the past hundred years, the conventional suspended-growth activated sludge processes have been widely used for the wastewater treatment. A typical activated sludge treatment is characterized by relatively high energy consumption and biomass production, leading to high operation costs and problems with the disposal of large amount of sludge. The technological development, improvement of operation conditions and enforcement of strict legislations in the recent years have led to the replacement of conventional suspended-growth activated sludge system by robust cost-effective and high-efficiency sequencing batch reactor (SBR), particularly in areas characterized by low or varying flow conditions. SBRs are basically suspended growth biological wastewater treatment reactors, in which all the metabolic reactions and solidliquid separation takes place in one tank and in a well-defined and continuously repeated time sequence.1 It is assumed that the periodic exposure of the microorganisms to defined process conditions is effectively achieved in a fed batch system wherein exposure time, frequency of exposure and amplitude of the respective concentration can be set independent of the inflow pattern.2 The SBR processes are known to save more than 60% of the expenses required for conventional activated sludge process in operating cost and achieve high effluent quality in a very short aeration time. Whereas, the conventional activated sludge systems require about 38 h of aeration.3 Initially, the technology was intended for small communities and high-strength industrial wastes but more recently there has been extensive application with other dilute waste sources. A SBR with suspended biomass configuration can perform relatively better in terms of carbon removal over conventional suspended growth systems.4 More than 90% biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) removal has been reported while the conventional processes are capable of removing 6095% of BOD.5 Also, significant reduction in suspended solids (SS) concentration (<10 mg/L) have been investigated.6

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SEQUENCING BATCH REACTOR

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SBRs are considered as fill and draw version of the activated sludge process. It is basically a batch reactor that operates under a series of periods that constitute a SBR cycle. The cycle generally consists of fill, react, settle, decant and idle periods. By manipulating these periods, the system could achieve biological nutrient removal using alternations of anoxic and aerobic periods within the treatment cycle. There can be two or more cycles per day depending upon the operational strategies desired.

SBR technology description

The process involves the following five stages: (1) Fill: During fill, the influent wastewater is added to the biomass that was left in the tank from the previous cycle. It may be either the raw wastewater or the primary effluent. The fill mode can be kept either aerated or nonaerated depending upon the wastewater characteristics. The length of the fill period depends on the number of tanks, volume of the SBRs and the flow rate of the effluent. Usually, the period lasts for 25% of the full cycle time. The change in the length of fill could alter productivity of the SBR process during optimization.7 (2) React: During react, wastewater flow to the tank is restricted while aeration and mixing continues. Reactions for substrate removal initiated during fill are completed during react. The time dedicated to react can exceed 50% of total cycle time. The treatment is controlled by air, either on or off, to produce anaerobic, anoxic or aerobic conditions. Controlling the time of mixing and/or aeration produces the degree of treatment required. The on/off cycling of air and mixers provides nitrification, denitrification and phosphorus removal. (3) Settle: During this phase, the entire aeration tank acts as a clarifier without any inflow or outflow. Quiescent conditions developed give rise to the better solid separation than that of conventional clarifiers. The settle period last between 0.5 and 1.5 h and prevent the solid blanket from floating due to gas buildup. (4) Draw (decant): After the settle phase, the clarified supernatant is discharged from the reactor as effluent. The withdrawal mechanism should be designed and operated in a manner that prevent floating material to be discharged. Excess waste activated sludge is also removed. The time dedicated to draw can range from 5 to 30% of the total cycle time with 45 min being a typical draw period. (5) Idle: The period between draw and fill is termed as idle. This phase is generally required when several SBRs are in operation. In a multitank system, its purpose is to complete the fill cycle before switching to another unit.

BIOLOGICAL NUTRIENT REMOVAL

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In recent years, considerable emphasis has been placed on reducing the quantities of nutrients discharged, mainly Nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) because they lead to problems of eutrophication and undesirable changes in aquatic population. Many studies therefore have been stimulated on understanding, developing and improving the biological nutrient removal process. Essentially, it encompasses an intricate array of biochemical processes to be sustained in an appropriate sequence of aerobic, anoxic and anaerobic conditions.

Biological nitrogen removal

The N removal basically involves the aerobic conversion of ammonia to nitrates (nitrification) and anoxic conversion of nitrate to nitrogen gas (denitrification). Nitrification is performed by nitrifying autotrophic bacteria, which are obligate aerobes, whereas denitrification is conducted by heterotrophic bacteria, which can utilize nitrate in place of oxygen under anaerobic/anoxic conditions. In the aerobic phase, pH showed a rapid increase due to CO 2 stripping, whereas the anaerobic phase is characterized by alkalinity production corresponding to the end of denitrification.8 SBR has proven to be a viable alternative to the continuous-flow systems in biological nutrient removal (BNR) by introducing anaerobic, anoxic and aerobic reactions in a single tank during a treatment cycle. The physical and chemical changes taking place due to microbial activity can be detected through on-line monitoring the pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), and oxidationreduction potential (ORP). The simulation and modeling approach have been well utilized for optimizing the SBR for chemical oxygen demand (COD) and N removal by adjusting the DO set points.9 The critical analysis of characteristic points on their profiles can even reflect the process of nitrification and denitrification. The process of simultaneous nitrificationdenitrification (SND) is usually controlled by carbon and nitrogen (C/N) ratio in the SBR. The adjustment control of the ratio is enviable while using ORP and pH as control parameters in both the anoxic and oxic phases. By adjusting the ratio, a high total nitrogen (TN) removal efficiency of up to 95.5% has been reported.10 A low COD/NH 4 -N ratio can result in a rapid C deficit, causing an unbalanced SND. On adjusting the ratio to 11.1, the SNDSBR system was reported to completely remove COD and NH 4 -N without leaving any NO 2 -N in the effluent.11 Likewise, in the presence of a low biodegradable COD/Total Kjeldahl Nitrogen (TKN) ratio, N removal via nitrite showed promising results for the process optimization.12 The inclusion of anoxic period right after the aeration period enhances the N-removal efficiency,13 yet this phase require the addition of external C sources such as glucose, methanol, acetate and propionate in case of dilute wastewater. Addition of acetate is reported to enhance the rate of denitrification to four times than methanol.14 However, for strong wastewater with high organic concentration, the amount of external C source has been reduced to 5%.15 An established SND technology thus, save operation time and energy, and replace the traditional two-stage biological nitrification and denitrification process.11
+ +

Biological phosphorus removal

Phosphorus removal is desired to control eutrophication because it is a limiting nutrient in most freshwater systems and leads to significant changes in water quality. The removal of P by a biological process is known as enhanced biological phosphorus removal (EBPR). The principal advantages of EBPR are the reduction of chemical cost and lower sludge production as compared to chemical precipitation.16 The EBPR consist of incorporating the P present in influent into cell biomass, which subsequently is removed from the system as a result of sludge wasting. The organisms responsible for this task are the phosphorus accumulating organisms (PAOs), which require two different conditions, aerobic and anaerobic, in order to encourage the P uptake. The P-removal efficiency as high as 90% have been reported in SBR, whereas in conventional activated sludge systems, maximum efficiency achieved is only 1020%.17 Several factors have been reported to affect P removal such as wastewater composition, influent COD:N:P ratio, cations in wastewater, temperature of wastewater, solids retention time (SRT), cycle length of SBR and type of inoculum. The addition of pure culture of Acinetobacter lwoffii to anaerobic/aerobic SBR inoculated initially with mixed culture significantly enhanced the EBPR rate. The system achieved complete PO 4
3

-P removal within 35 days of operation.18 Similarly, a salt tolerant organism, Halobacter halobium

added to the activated sludge culture of saline wastewater has been reported to improve the nutrient removal performance of the SBR.19 Due to the complexity of processes and the excessive number of process components involved in EBPR, systematic assessment of operating strategies becomes impractical. Various modeling approaches such as the Activated Sludge Model No. 2 (ASM2) although provide an acceptably reliable description for N transformations, generally lacked sufficient reliability for the fate of P, mainly because they did not incorporate sufficient experimental support, and also, the behavior of PAOs did not always appear quite predictable.20 In the light of above research, ASM2 was modified as ASM2d to evaluate the performance of SBR for simultaneous N and P removal by incorporating denitrification via PAOs, with reduced anoxic P uptake.21

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SIMULTANEOUS NITROGEN AND PHOSPHORUS REMOVAL

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Previously, the laboratory scale SBRs and process conditions have shown a very high degree of biological nutrient removal even on very unfavorable domestic wastewater that was low in biodegradable COD.22 Similarly, with extremely high N and P containing wastewater, such as from abattoirs, very good preliminary results have been achieved.23 If N removal without EBPR is the main objective, the system should be operated with the shortest possible cycle time at high recycle ratios. However, if EBPR along with N removal is required, longer cycle time should be selected to operate with minimum (sludge) recycle ratio.24 Moreover, the alternate aerobic, anoxic and anaerobic phases with careful optimization of order and duration of different reaction stages are imperative. The conventional anaerobicaerobic processes incorporating an anoxic zone for denitrification have been already applied for N and P removal in full-scale wastewater treatment plants.25 The incorporation of anoxic phase in anaerobicaerobic SBR has shown an increase in the ratio of anoxic phosphate uptake to the aerobic phosphate uptake from 11 to 64%.26 Furthermore, N and P removal can also be achieved by employing pH and ORP values as control parameters. pH is reported as ideal parameter during the oxic phase while ORP during the anoxic phase.27 Using pH, ORP and oxygen uptake rate (OUR) profiles, the termination times of nitrification, carbon oxidation, as well as endogenic and exogenic denitrification during SBR cycle could be identified. This will lead to an increase in reactor productivity (in terms of C, N and P removal) and a good adaptation of load variation.28 More than 98% removal of N and P has been achieved from piggery wastewater by optimizing cycle time and process modeling intended for better understanding of reactor behavior.29 Significant P removal can also be attained by using PAOs capable of denitrification in a single-sludge system coexisting with nitrifers.30 The efficiency of nutrient removals is affected by variations in the influent composition. Researchers have performed wastewater treatment studies for a large spectrum of wastes, ranging from simple domestic sewage to different industrial effluents for removing organics, N and P.2, 3133 A summary of several works focusing on operational strategy and removal efficiency of SBRs for treatment of synthetic, urban and industrial wastewater is given in Table 1. Table 1. Summary of experimental studies on SBR References COD (mg/L) Synthetic wastewater Akin and Ugurulu99 Coelho et al.7 Hamamoto et al.100 Kargi and Uygur45 Kargi and Uygur101 Kuba et al.25 Lee et al.26 Sirianuntapiboon et al.102 Tam et al.103 Villaverde et al.104 Wang et al.105 Yu et al.106 Urban wastewater Bernades and Klapwijk107 Chang and Hao108 Choi et al.109 Debik and Manav110 Hamamoto et al.100 Keller et al.111 Rim et al.30 Shin et al.112 Industrial wastewater Andreottola et al.113 Choi et al.114 Garrido et al.115 Kabacinski et al.116 Keller et al.33 Li et al.37 Lemaire et al.117 Maranon, et al.118 1400 46 180 10004000 740 14002400 4700 2870 1345 1536 Obaja et al.119 Obaja et al.120 Schwarzenbeck et al.121 Sirianuntapiboon et al.102 Sirianuntapiboon and Hongsrisuwan122 Tilche et al.29 3970 2800 2638 1668 28 760 252 4455 150500 55 170200 350 256 548 567 1650 900 140 21 21
d d d d

Influent TN (mg/L) TP (mg/L) t c (h)

Operation HRT (d) SRT (d)

Removal efficiency C (%) N (%) P (%)

400 513 169

c

53

21 41.5 7.4 18

12 8 6 10.5 6 8 24 12 8 8

1 3 0.625 0.83 12

25 10 10 12 16 20 7 1015

97 97.7 94 96 100 92 75.1 95 93.5 86

39 99.6 86 90 99 88 88 63.2 97 36 60

80 96 57 94 99 100 98.6 21

50b 35.8 53.6 60 119 40 60d 42 630 41

d a

632 1200 400 600 2200 300 1500 400 300

15 15 6 20 5.5

443 296 200 545 200 563 139 79

b

71

7 6.9 5

4.4 8 8 6 4 12 12

3.3 0.67 0.3 0.322 1.95 0.34

20 15 25 28 23

95 91 95 93.3 75

83 61 52 78 96 96 55.7 94

86 78 88 87 93 84 75.8

30.1 25 56.7 43 54.5 45 91

d

12 7 9.7 3.9

8.5 702 7.5 3555 26 40 150 90 30 10 450

12 24 24 6 6 8 6 48 24 8 7 8 24 24 24

1 44 4.4 0.75 1.75 137 2.416 1 0.87 3 3 10

26 20 14.5 15 5.7 11 11 16 47 15

91 97 98 97 94 97 95 69 69.1 90 75.1 92 98.8

95.2

88.5 89 75 97 98 68.7 94.8 97.8 67 98.0

a

93.4 6099 74 97 95 97 84.5 79.6 98 99.8 80 63.2 78.1 98.6

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SBR: DIFFERENT MODES OF OPERATION

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The design and operation of SBR must consider the biological process requirement and the hydraulic regime to maintain the quality of treatment. The fill strategy and the cycle time control are important factors to be taken into consideration while optimizing the treatment process.34 While designing the fill strategy for the treatment of toxic wastewater, its biodegradability and concentration should be taken into account. The nonaerated fill mode has shown better results at lower influent phenol concentration as it had no filamentous bacterial growth. But at higher phenol concentration, the aerated SBR proved successful as the nonaerated one accumulated phenol to concentration inhibitory to microorganisms.35 With effluent concentration from 100 to 1000 mg/L, the fill strategy (aerated or nonaerated) showed no effect on phenol degradation. However, the aerated mode reduced the react time for phenol removal.36 Another study evaluated the effects of aeration rates on the performance of intermittently aerated SBRs. The optimum aeration rate of 0.8 L/min produced the best system performance. Removals of COD, TN and Total Phosphorus (TP) from slaughterhouse wastewater were up to 97, 94 and 97%, respectively.37 The operation sequence of the SBR system is given in Fig. 1. Figure 1. A complete operational cycle of the laboratory-scale SBR system.37

During the treatment of synthetic phenolic wastewater, the anoxic phenol degradation at different cycle length and influent phenol concentration was studied. With 6 h cycle and 1050 mg/L of phenol concentration, around 80% removal was achieved. Beyond this concentration, phenol and COD removal efficiency decreased.38 During the biodegradation of toxic compounds like 4-nitrophenol (4NP), both long feed phase and high-acclimatized biomass concentration reduced the substrate concentration peak and thereby improved the process efficiency.39 The essential role of feeding time for treating toxic wastewater has also been recognized. Experiments on treating a mixture of 4-chlorophenol (4-CP) and 2,4-dichlorophenol (2,4-DCP) showed that at short feeding time, the degradation of 4-CP was more strongly inhibited by 2,4-DCP, whereas the longer feeding increased its removal rate.40 Step feeding could also greatly improve the N-removal efficiency exceeding more than 98% while requiring a small amount of external C source.41 The phase duration within a cycle has been reported to strongly influence the treatment efficiency of SBRs. In a study, the 24 h cyclic anaerobicaerobic SBR was evaluated to study the biological color removal from textile effluent. With 10 h aerated reaction phase, around 90 and 75% color removal was achieved for violet and black dye, respectively. However, the removal efficiency for violet dye was reduced from 90 to 75% when the aeration phase was increased from 10 to 12 h.42 Similarly, a best operative strategy for N and COD removal from combined wastewater of landfill leachate and milk industry was determined. Using a 24-h cycle, the efficiency of different operational modes with aerobic fill, aerobic react, anoxic react, settle, draw and idle sequences were evaluated. The most appropriate mode was with 19 h aeration time and 2 h anoxic phase.43 The finding also concluded that N and COD removal efficiencies of SBR decreases with increased organic loading or decreased Hydraulic Residence Time (HRT). The HRT and organic loading are thus important variable that influences the SBR operation. In another experiment, the influence of HRT and filling strategy (short filling period and filling during the reaction period) with and without mixing phase in the SBR cycle was studied. By increasing the HRT of leachate, organics removal efficiency improved, particularly under operational conditions with mixing and aeration phases in the SBR cycle. At lower HRT, the system with filling over the reaction period showed better results.44 The system performance is also affected by number of operating stages and the total cycle time employed. Out of three operations, i.e. the three-step anaerobic (An)/anoxic (Ax)/oxic (Ox); the four-step (An/Ox/Ax/Ox) and the five-step (An/Ax/Ox/Ax/Ox) phases, the highest nutrient removals were achieved by using the five-step operation with percent COD, NH 4 -N, NO 3 -N and PO 4
+ 3

-P removals of 94, 90, 64 and 57%, respectively. The additional anoxic and oxic phases provided removal of excess N and P from synthetic
+

wastewater.45 However, the biological treatment of landfill leachates usually result in low nutrient removal because of its high COD, high NH 4 -N content and presence of toxic compounds such as heavy metals. The five-step operation was found efficient in successful biotreatment of leachate as well.46 The efficiency of such process can be further improved by using ultrasound pretreated raw landfill leachates, especially for the removal of N compounds and organic matter.47 Similarly, swine wastewater is also considered notorious wastewater for biological treatment process due to extremely strong concentration. Efforts have been made to reduce N and P with intermittent feeding method by dividing each 24-h SBR cycle into four sub-cycles each with anoxic period of 1 h and aerobic period of 3 h (Fig. 2). The NH 4 -N and PO 4 aerobic and anoxic modes. More than 97% reduction in COD and 99% removal of nitrate during denitrification has been reported within 10 days of reactor operation.48 Figure 2. Schematic diagram of overall SBR operating cycle.15
+ 3

-P

were effectively removed due to high C/N ratio and readily biodegradable organic.15 Likewise, shrimp aquaculture wastewater having high C/N ratio was treated sequentially, viz.

The efficiency of the system can be further improved by installing some pretreatment unit prior to the SBR, which includes equalization, chemical addition, ammonia/air stripping and chlorination.49 Application of coagulation/flocculation (C/F) followed by SBR process is most suitable for the treatment of hard to biodegrade wastewater such as from dyes industry. The SBR effluent after chemical pretreatment achieved 68.2, 76.3 and 61.4% reduction in Total Chemical Oxygen Demand (TCOD), Total Biochemical Oxygen Demand (TBOD) and total suspended solids (TSS), respectively.50 Likewise, for the treatment of textile wastewater, chemical oxidation with fenton's reagent prior to biological treatment in SBR has been considered as the best option.51 Similarly, the combined process of air stripping, fenton, SBR and coagulation was investigated for the treatment of landfill leachate. The air stripping and fenton process as pretreatment steps removed 96.6% ammonia and 60.8% COD, respectively.52 However, the refractory organic and inorganic compounds from leachate was removed by combining electro-fenton oxidation and SBR process.53 Nevertheless, the most intricate and expensive aspect of wastewater treatment is the collection, processing and disposal of sludge. The expense of excess sludge treatment has been estimated to be 5060% of the total cost of municipal wastewater treatment.54 Thickening, conditioning, dewatering and drying are primarily used to remove moisture from sludge. After thickening, a variety of sludge handling and disposal options are available that include digestion, incineration, land filling, land application, etc. But the application depends largely on sludge constituents that vary with the source of wastewater and treatment processes applied. Therefore, the best approach would be to modify the aerobic treatment processes to reduce biosolids production. The SBRs can well accomplish low sludge production by increasing the sludge age.55 In addition, raising the concentration of dissolved oxygen in the mixed liquor also reduces the excess sludge production.56 Some authors have discussed the beneficial effects of performing the biological nitrogen removal process via nitrite, as it saves 25% of the aeration costs as well as reduces the amount of sludge produced.57 The anaerobicanoxic sequencing batch reactor (A 2 SBR) process has been recently proposed as an attractive process because of low sludge production and saving aeration cost for complete phosphorus and nitrogen removal.58

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GRANULATION IN SBR

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Granulation involves cell-to-cell interactions resulting in regular, dense and strong structure granules with good settling properties. These granules are actually a dense microbial consortia packed with different bacterial species that perform different roles in degrading the complex industrial wastes. Microscopic investigations have shown that it is a gradual progression from seed sludge to compact aggregates, further to granular sludge and finally to mature granules.59 Compared to conventional activated flocs, aerobic granular sludge has a regular, dense and strong physical structure.60 Its high settling capacity results in less sludge production and enables the system to withstand high-strength wastewater and shock loadings. Aerobic granulation in SBRs has been reported by many researchers.6163 It is widely used in treating high-strength wastewaters containing organics, N and P, and toxic substances64, 60 as the SBR operation conditions (cyclic feeding and starvation, high shear stress and short settling time) promote development of granules. Some factors affecting the process of granulation are substrate composition,65 organic loading rate,66 hydrodynamic shear force,67, 68 feeding strategy,69 dissolved oxygen,70 hydraulic cycle time,71 settling time72, 62 and volume exchange ratio.72 Aerobic granulation is driven by selection pressure and the settling time acts as a major hydraulic selection pressure on microbial community, which controls the formation and characteristics of the granules. A short settling time preferentially selects for the growth of fast settling bacteria and the sludge with a poor settleability is washed out. Reduction in settle-time in SBR cycle can convert flocculating sludge to granular sludge.73 The performance of the SBR process is determined by the physical characteristics of granules.74 Granules with greater sizes or fast settling properties are known to have an advantage over flocs of slower settling velocity.61 It prevents sludge washout and maintains low TSS in the treated effluent.75 The high volume exchange ratio also results in rapid granulation76 and increase in influent C/N ratio with a large percentage of granules in the sludge are favorable for SND.66 However, the stability of granules is dependent on the wastewater characteristics. Studies have shown that the variation of the wastewater could disrupt the granule stability, despite the control for balanced nutrient supply.77 Another finding correlated it with organic loading and concluded that high loading would be favorable for granule stability.66 Some researchers consider shear force (described in terms of superficial upflow gas velocity) as necessary parameter in aerobic granulation. The low superficial gas velocities results in granular instability.62 Contrary to this, findings have shown that even at high shear force, the granules failed to develop at a DO concentration less than 5 mg/L. This suggests that DO is more significant to granule formation than shear force.70 The granulation technology could be used for the treatment of toxic organic wastewater too. The treatment however requires the seeding enrichment for obtaining biomass with improved settleability and higher degradation activity. Batch incubation experiments showed that the p-nitrophenol (PNP) degrading granules developed by implementing progressive decreases in settling time and stepwise increases in PNP concentration were distinct in shape and capable of nearly completing PNP removal.65

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INNOVATIONS IN SBR DESIGN AND OPERATION

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Due to stringent effluent standards imposed by the regulatory authorities, there is an urgent need of process upgradation to improve the overall performance of the conventional SBRs. The concept of hybrid SBR systems therefore, being conceptualized that provides advantages of both the suspended and attached growth phase at the same time. It ensures carbonaceous oxidation and nitrification in a single reactor along with treatment of slowly bio-degradable substances. Several researchers are currently focused on these upgraded hybrid systems such as Porous biomass carrier sequencing batch reactor (PBCSBR), which is a hybrid of SBR technology and porous biomass support system technology. The nutrient removal efficiency of this system was improved by time sequenced anoxic/oxic phases and high biomass.78 Similarly, use of plastic media at the bottom of the SBR system increased the removal efficiencies, improved sludge quality, reduced the amount of excess bio-sludge, and also reduced the acclimatization period of the system.79 Besides this, the powdered activated carbon (PAC) and polyurethane (PU) foam have also been employed as hybrid media and could maintain sufficient biomass in the reactor even under vigorous mixing conditions.80 Moreover, there are several other process modifications of SBRs such as sequencing batch biofilm reactor (SBBR), anaerobic sequencing batch reactor (ASBR) and granular activated carbon sequencing batch reactor (GAC-SBR) that are discussed below in detail.

Sequencing batch biofilm reactor

High concentration and stable activity of biomass in a bioreactor are most important conditions to remove N from high-strength wastewater. Attached-growth (biofilm) biological systems have great advantages for the treatment of high-strength wastewater because it results in higher biomass concentration per unit reactor.81 Furthermore, this high biomass density allows greater biomass concentration to be maintained in the reactor.82 The biofilm are usually considered as a sink for nutrients and inorganic material. These could temporarily store the substrate during peak loading situations and utilize it as soon as the influent loading drops. The adsorption, ion exchange and absorption processes have been reported as basic mechanism in substrate storage.83 Several studies have been performed by modifying the typical SBR to provide high surface area for biofilm formation, either on carrier materials or on carrierless form for treatment of wastewater.84 Use of plastic media (2.7 m 2 surface area) in a sequencing batch reactor biofilm system has been reported to increase the system efficiency and bio-sludge quality.79 Another lab-scale reactor employed eight flexible fiber bundles to enhance the surface area for biofilm formation and achieved up to 89.797% COD removal efficiency.85 Furthermore, consistent N and P removal was achieved with patented KMT efficiency of the system is much higher than conventional SBR. The SBBR have recently substituted conventional SBRs in treating various types of toxic industrial wastewater. The efficiency of SBBR in treating cyanide containing wastewater was evaluated. The results showed that the SBBR with the cycle time of 48 h was capable of removing 20 mg/L of cyanide.87 The schematic diagram of experimental set-up is shown in Fig. 3. Figure 3. Schematic diagram of sequencing batch biofilm reactor.87

polyethylene biofilm carriers in moving-bed SBBR.86 The results suggest that pollutant-removal

Anaerobic sequencing batch reactor

An ASBR is a high rate anaerobic process similar to aerobic SBR, except that it is not aerated during reaction phase. The anaerobic metabolism of substrate produces methane and carbon dioxide, and operates according to the following cyclic steps: feed, reaction, settling and discharge.88 This has greatly improved the economics of treatment of low-strength wastewaters. The main advantages of this type of operation are its operational simplicity, efficient quality control of the effluent, flexibility of use and high biogas yield. However, operation of this reactor requires some type of agitation to improve transfer of the substrate to the micro-organisms in the granulated biomass for anaerobic degradation.89 Agitation may be achieved by recirculating the liquid or gas phases90 or by mechanical stirring.91 This fact is directly due to the lack of homogeneity in the reaction medium brought about by low biogas production, which is a result of the low substrate concentration since the start-up of operation. The system performance is directly related to biomass settling. Self-immobilization process is not sufficient to achieve good settleability. Hence, capability of biomass immobilized in inert supports has been explored to provide biomass retention even under adverse operating conditions. Use of polyurethane foam as inert support could achieve high organic matter removal efficiency and high solids retention, eliminating the settling step.91 However, such system requires the implementation of mixing to maintain mass transfer rates. The technological potentials of ASBR have already been assessed for some types of effluents such as dairy wastewater,92 brewery wastewater93 and low-strength synthetic wastewater.94 However, many scientific features still have to be studied to achieve better understanding of the operational aspects of this reactor.95

Granular activated carbon sequencing batch reactor

A GAC-SBR has been developed for the removal of volatile, semi-volatile and nonvolatile organic contaminants from wastewater using activated carbon via physical adsorption mechanism. Together with biological treatment processes, activated carbon can increase the pollutants removal efficiency, even at low HRT, due to its sorption capacity. Studies have shown that increasing the flow rate around the GAC particles results in good mass transfer of substrate from the bulk liquid. Moreover, its potential as a media for microorganisms in attached growth system also has been evaluated. The role of GAC-SBR in the treatment of textile wastewater containing direct and disperse dyes has been well realized. The efficiency of GAC-SBR decreases with the increase of dyestuff concentration but the addition of carbon source could improve the overall performance of the system. Around 30 and 20% increase in the removal efficiency of direct dye was observed on adding glucose and rice noodle wastewater, respectively.96 Similarly, disperse dyes were also reported to be effectively removed from textile wastewater with removal efficiency as high as 93%.97 In a study, the efficiency of both SBR (using biosludge as adsorbent) and GAC-SBR systems were explored for heavy metals (Pb GAC-SBR system at same organic loading and HRT. The removal efficiencies of Pb depicts the scheme of the reactor for SBR and GAC-SBR systems.98 Figure 4. Scheme of the reactor for SBR and GAC-SBR systems.98
2+ 2+

, Ni

2+

) removal. The results indicated that

efficiency of both systems increased with the increase of HRT or the decrease of organic loading. However, the SBR system showed higher heavy metals removal efficiency than , Ni
2+

, BOD , COD and TKN were 88.6, 94.6, 91.3, 82 and 63%, respectively. Figure 4

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CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE R&D AREAS

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A critical analysis of literature reveals that there is a strong possibility to treat wide variety of wastewater by using SBR technology. Use of appropriate operational strategy in SBR seems to be promising as compared to conventional activated sludge systems due to its ease of automation, aeration devices and on-line computer systems. There is the possibility of adjusting the actual length of each phase according to the treatment objectives. But the more sophisticated programmable logic control operation required at larger SBR plants tends to discourage its use for large flow-rates. Also, plugging of aeration devices during selected operating cycles is another problem observed in SBR. In the last years, a number of modeling approaches have been tried to systematically assess reactor design and operating strategies, thus allowing for system optimization. Though, the models have provided a reliable description for N transformations, still a similar approach is yet to be developed for EBPR. Similarly, the aerobic granules have shown immense potential for treatment of wastewater containing toxic organic pollutants. However, there is a need for further exploration of the degradation capability to handle complex recalcitrant wastewater. It also needs to be examined to what extent aerobic microbial granules are amenable to bioaugmentation, whereby special natural or engineered catabolic strains could be integrated into pre-cultured degradative granules for further enhancement of their substrate conversion capabilities. Although consistent removal of N and P has been achieved by various reactor modifications, still the technology is considered appropriate for treatment of merely intermittent or small flow wastewater. Surprisingly, in this promising research area, several engineering process features still have to be studied to achieve better insight into the operational aspects of this reactor, thereby enabling application in real situations with an optimized procedure. An extensive study on this aspect is thus warranted.

Acknowledgements

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We are grateful to G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar, India for providing necessary facilities during the manuscript preparation. Special thanks are extended by first author to Dr. Tirthankar Banerjee for his critical suggestions and expertise to improve this manuscript.

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