Design and feasibility analysis of a self-sustaining biofiltration system for removal of low concentration N2O emitted from wastewater treatment plants

Abstract

N2O is a potent greenhouse gas and ozone-depletion agent. In this study, a biofiltration system was designed for removal of N2O emitted at low concentrations (<200 ppmv) from wastewater treatment plants. The proposed biofiltration system utilizes untreated wastewater from the primary sedimentation basin as the source of electron donor and nutrients and energy requirement is minimized by utilizing gravitational force and pressure differential to direct liquid medium and gas through the biofilter. The experiments performed with laboratory-scale biofilter in two different configurations confirmed the feasibility of the biofiltration system. The biofilter operated with cycling of raw wastewater exhibited up to 94% and 53% removal efficiency with 100 ppmv N2O in N-2 and air, respectively, as the feed gas, corroborating that untreated wastewater can serve as a robust Inflow source of electron donor and nutrients.The laboratory-scale biofilter operated with a continuous flow-through of synthetic wastewater attained >99.9% removal of N2O from N-2 background at the gas flow rate up to 2,000 mL.min(-1) and >50% N2O removal from air background at the gas flow rate of 200 mL.min(-1) nosZ-containing bacterial genera including Flavobacterium (5.92%), Pseudomonas (4.26%) and Bosea (2.39%) were identified in the biofilm samples collected from the oxic biofilter, indicating these organisms were responsible for N2O removal.