Mainstream partial nitritation and anammox in a 200,000 m³/day activated sludge process in Singapore: Scale-down by using laboratory fed-batch reactor

A laboratory fed-batch reactor has been used to study under controlled conditions the performance of partial nitritation/anammox for the 200,000 m³/day step-feed activated sludge process at the Changi Water Reclamation Plant, Singapore. The similarity of the concentrations of NH₄, NO₂, NO₃, PO₄, suspended chemical oxygen demand (sCOD), pH, and alkalinity (ALK) between the on-site process and laboratory reactor illustrates that the laboratory fed-batch reactor can be used to simulate the site performance. The performance of the reactor fed by primary effluent illustrated the existence of anammox and heterotrophic denitrification and apparent excessive biological phosphorus removal as observed from the site. The performance of the reactor fed by final effluent proved the presence of anammox process on site. Both the laboratory reactor and on-site process showed that higher influent 5-day biochemical oxygen demand/total nitrogen (BOD₅/TN) (COD/TN) ratio increases the nitrogen removal efficiency of the process.