Chapter 5

Introduction to the methods

of Waste Water Treatment

2020

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5.1 Introduction
Wastewater collected from urban areas and from different
industries must ultimately be returned to receiving water
bodies or to the land.
 The contaminants (pollutants) in wastewater are removed
by physical, chemical and/or biological means, and the
individual methods usually are classified as physical,
chemical and biological unit processes or operations.

 Treatment methods in which the application of physical

forces predominates are known as physical unit
operations.
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 continued
 Typical physical unit operations are: screening, mixing,
flocculation, sedimentation, flotation, and filtration and
membrane filter operations.
 Treatment methods in which the removal or conversion
of contaminants is brought about by the addition of
chemicals or by other chemical reactions are known as
chemical unit processes.
 Neutralization, oxidation, reduction, precipitation, gas
transfer, adsorption, ion-exchange etc. are the most
common examples of these processes used in wastewater
treatment.
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 continued
 Treatment methods in which the removal of
contaminants is brought about by biological activity are
known as biological unit processes.
 Biological treatment is used primarily to remove the
biodegradable organic substances (colloidal or dissolved)
in wastewater.
5.1 Purpose of sewage treatment
• The primary purpose of the treatment of sewage is to
prevent the pollution of the receiving waters.
• Specific concern is protection of human health by the
destruction of pathogenic organisms present in sewage
prior to treated effluent being discharged to receiving
water bodies and land. 4
 5.2 Wastewater Treatment Standards
Effluents from different establishments should be treated
before being discharged to receiving bodies so that it
should be:
Free from materials and heat in quantities,
concentrations or combinations which are toxic or
harmful to human, animal, aquatic life.
Free from anything that will settle in receiving waters
or that will adversely affect aquatic life.
Free from floating debris, oil, scum and other
materials in amounts sufficient to be noticeable in
receiving waters.

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 Free from materials and heat that alone, or in
combination with other materials will produce color,
turbidity, taste or odor in sufficient concentration to
create a nuisance or adversely affect aquatic life in
receiving waters.
 Free from nutrients in concentrations that create
nuisance, growths of aquatic weeds or algae in the
receiving waters.

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Specific Limits
 Effluents discharged to receiving water bodies should
achieved the following minimum wastewater quality
limits

BOD5is the oxygen equivalent of organic matter.

It is determined by measuring the dissolved oxygen
used by microorganisms during the biochemical
of organic matter in 5 days at 20oC

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8
Flow chart for wastewater treatment processes

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5.3 General classification of WW treatment methods
1. Preliminary waste water Treatment
 Preliminary treatment consists of separating the floating
materials (like dead animals, tree branches, papers,
pieces of rags, wood, etc.), and also the heavy Settle able
inorganic solids.
 It also helps in removing the oils and greases, etc. from
the sewage.
 This treatment reduces the BOD of the wastewater, by
about 15 - 30%.
 The processes used are
Screening
Grit chambers
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 A. Screening
 Is the very first operation carried out at a sewage
treatment plant, and consists of passing the sewage
through different types of screens, so as to trap and
remove the floating matter, such as pieces of cloth,
paper, wood, hair, kitchen refuse, focal solids, etc
Types of Screens
Depending on the size of opening screens can be classified as:
I. Coarse screens: are also known as Racks, and the
spacing between the bars (i.e. opening size) is about 50 mm
or more.
 These screens help in removing large floating objects
from sewage. They will collect about 6 litters of solids
per million litter of sewage 11
 II. Medium screens

 the spacing between bars is about 6 to 40 mm.

 These screens will ordinarily collect 30 to 90 litters of
material per million litter of sewage.
 They are made of steel bars, fixed parallel to one
another at desired spacing on a rectangular steel frame,
and are called bar screens.
 Now-a-days, these screens are generally kept inclined at
about 30 to 60° to the direction of flow,

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continued

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 III. Fine Screens
have perforations of 1.5 mm to 3 mm in size.
The installation of these screens proves very effective,
and they remove as much as 20% of the suspended solids
from sewage.
These screens, however, get clogged very often, and need
frequent cleaning.

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 Head Loss Through Bar Screen
Can be calculated by:

Where;
c=empirical discharge coefficient to account for
turbulence and eddy motion. (c=0.7 for clean bar and
0.6 for clogged bar screen)
V2=velocity of flow through openings
V1= approaching velocity of upstream channel
g= gravitational acceleration (9.81m/s2)

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 Head Loss Through fine Screen
 Similarly for fine screen the head loss is given by:

 Where;
c=empirical discharge coefficient to account for turbulence
and eddy motion. (c=0.6)
g= gravitational acceleration (9.81m/s2)
Q= discharge (m3/s)
A=effective opening area of the screen

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 B. Comminutor
 Are the patented devices, which break the larger sewage
solids to about 6mm in size, when the sewage is screened
through them.
 Used to grid or cut waste solids.
 Such a device consists of a revolving slotted drum,
through which the sewage is screened.

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 C. Grit channels
 Are the sedimentation basins placed in front of the
wastewater treatment plant.

 The grit chamber remove the inorganic particles (specific

gravity about 2.65 and nominal diameter of 0.15 to
0.20mm or larger) such as sand, gravel, grit, egg shells,
bones, and other non-putresible materials that may clog
channels or damage pumps due to abrasion, and to
prevent their accumulation in sludge digesters.

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 2. Primary waste water treatment
 Primary treatment consists in removing large suspended
organic solids.

 This is usually accomplished by sedimentation.

 The basin in which the sedimentation process carried out

is primary sedimentation tank.

 Removal of suspended solids ranges from 50–65%, and

30–40% reduction of the five-day biochemical oxygen
demand (BOD) can be expected.

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 continued
 Sedimentation is removal of particulate materials
suspended in water by quiescent settling due to gravity.
 It is designed to remove only the heavy inorganic solids of
size more than 0.2 mm and of sp. gravity 2.65) are
generally removed by the sedimentation tanks.
 The sedimentation tanks are thus designed to remove a part
of the organic matter from the sewage effluent coming out
from the grit chambers.

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 Sedimentation tank
Types of settling
• Depending on the particles concentration and the
interaction between particles, four types of settling can
occur,

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 Type I Sedimentation (Discrete particle settling)
 The particles settle without interaction and occur under
low solids concentration.
 Particles do not change in size, shape and weight.
 Particles settle as individual particles and do not
flocculate or stick to other particles during settling.
 Examples of these particles are sand and girt material.
 the vertical velocity of the particle with respect to the
surrounding fluid will remain constant.

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 Type II Sedimentation (Flocculent settling)
 Under quiescent conditions suspended particles in many
waters exhibit a natural tendency to agglomerate or the
addition of chemical agents promotes this tendency.
This phenomenon is known as flocculent.
 Particles collide and adhere to each other resulting in
particle growth
 Since they flocculate, their size, shape, weight and
settling velocity will increase.

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 Type III Sedimentation (Hindered/Zone settling)
 Hindered/zone settling ;Inter-particle forces are
sufficient to hinder the settling of neigh boring particles.
 The particles tend to remain in fixed positions with
respect to each others.
 Particles are so close together movement is restricted
 Solids move as a block rather than individual particles

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 Type IV Sedimentation (Compression settling)
 This occurs when the particle concentration is high, so
that particles at one level are mechanically influenced by
particles on lower levels.
 The settling velocity then drastically (highly) reduces.
 Particles physically in contact
 Water is displaced from pores as particles settle
 Volume of solids may decrease
 High concentration of solids (sludge)

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continued

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Comparison of preliminary and primary treatment
methods

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 3. Secondary/Biological/wastewater treatment
 After primary treatment, the greater part of the BOD
remaining in the sewage is in the form of dissolved
organic matter.
 Secondary sewage treatment, which is predominantly
biological, is designed to remove most of this organic
matter and reduce the BOD
 The primary purpose of secondary waste water treatment
is to reduce BOD.
 The principal biological process used for wastewater
treatment can be divided into two
 Suspended growth
 Attached growth (or bio film) process
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 Suspended growth (Activated sludge system )
 Microorganism(biomass) responsible for treatment
maintained in liquid suspension by aporaparate mixing
method
 Increase suspended biomass concentration
 Many time Domestic waste water operated with positive
dissolved oxygen conc.(Aerobic)
Attached growth (or biofilm) process.
 Microorganism(biomass) responsible for treatment
maintained in attached to an inert pocking material
 The organic mater and nutrient removed from ww flowing
past attached growth –Biofilms
 Packing material for attach: rock, gravel, slang, plastic etc.
 Trickling filter
 Rotating Biological Contractor(RBC) 29
 The activated-sludge
Activated Sludge is a multi-chamber reactor unit that
makes use of (mostly) aerobic microorganisms to
degrade organics in wastewater and to produce a high-
quality effluent.

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 Trickling Filter
 Old process for the secondary treatment of domestic wastewater
dating from the beginning of the 20th century
 A trickling filter is a fixed bed, biological filter that operates under
(mostly) aerobic conditions.
 The wastewater moves through the filter, the organic matter is
adsorbed onto the film and degraded by a mixed population of
aerobic microorganisms.

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continued

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 Rotating Biological Contractor(RBC)
 RBC is a simple, effective method of providing secondary
wastewater treatment.
 The system consists of biomass media, usually plastic, that is
partially immersed in the wastewater.
 As it slowly rotates, it lifts a film of wastewater into the air, the
wastewater trickles down across the media and absorbs oxygen
from the air.

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 Secondary Clarifier (Secondary sedimentation
basin)
 With the majority of the suspended material removed
from the sewage, the liquid portion flows over a weir at
the surface of the secondary settling tank
 Chlorination of the effluent from the secondary settling
tank takes place in accordance with state and local laws
 The bacteria are subsequently removed in secondary
clarifiers
 A secondary sedimentation basin (clarifier) is usually
required to settle bacteria.

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 4. Tertiary waste water treatment
 More advanced processes (advanced or tertiary
treatment) may be required for special wastes.
 When the effluent from secondary treatment is
unacceptable, a third level of treatment, tertiary
treatment, can be employed.
 The purpose of tertiary treatment is to provide a final
treatment stage to raise the effluent quality before it is
discharged to the receiving environment (sea, river, lake,
ground, etc.). Which includes:
Filtration, Nutrient removal, Nitrogen removal,
Phosphorus removal, Disinfection, Odour Control etc.
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 Generally there are two types of wastewater treatment
system:
On-site Sewage Treatment (decentralized)
 WW treated at the point of production (generation)

 example septic tank

Centralized Sewage Treatment

 Collects WW from all Residences and

treated at the treatment site far from point

of WW generation. 36
5.4 Septic Tanks design

A septic tank is a watertight tank, usually located just

below ground.

Homes and businesses in areas of low population

density that are not connected to municipal sewerage
systems often use a septic tank.

A device whose operation is similar in principle to

primary settling.
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 continued
Sewage enters a holding tank, and suspended solids settle
out and the sludge in the tank must be pumped out
periodically and disposed of.
The effluent flows through a system of perforated piping
into a leaching (soil drainage) field.
Septic tank design
The guidelines and the design criteria for typical septic
tanks are as follows:
Septic tanks should be watertight so that they do not
permit way- in groundwater and way- out sewage
A septic tank installation shall be provided for both
settlement of solids and partial biological treatment
of sewage. 38
 continued
 Septic tank could be constructed from bricks, stone
masonry, HCB, concrete etc

 Calculation of the total capacity of septic tank shall

be made on the basis of

The number of persons to be served,

Water consumption,

Sludge production per capita and

The hydraulic detention time.

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 continued
 Since the digestion process is anaerobic, not requiring
oxygen, no direct ventilation is necessary.

 However, provision should be made to permit the escape

of the gases produced in the tank, thorough a ventilation
pipe.
 The following formula is recommended for general use:
V= Vww+ Vd Vc1=1/3* V, Vc2=2/3* V
Vww= Td x P x q
Vd = v x Nd x P
V= (Td x P x q) /103 + (v x Nd x P)/ 103 40
 continued
Where
V= Effective volume of the tank- m3
Vww = volume of ww.
Vd = volume of sludge produced.
Td = Hydraulic detention time in days – min. 1 day
P =User population.
q =Water consumption per capita per day- liters
v = Sludge production per capita per day- litres (approx.
0.15l.
Nd=Number of days between desludging-min. 365 days.

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 example
Design a septic tank for the following data:
No of population= 100
Sewage /capita/day= 120 Liter
De-sludging period=1 year
Length : width =3:1

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 5.5 SEWAGE EFFLUENT DISPOSAL
The study of the sources/place of disposal is important,
because the amount of treatment required to be given to
sewage depends very much upon the source of disposal,
There are two general methods of disposing of the
sewage effluents:
a) Dilution i.e. disposal in water; and
b) Effluent Irrigation or Broad Irrigation or Sewage
Farming, i.e. disposal on land

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 1. Disposal by dilution
 Disposal by dilution is the process whereby the treated
sewage or the effluent from the sewage treatment plant is
discharged into a river stream, or a large body of water,
such as a lake or sea.
 The discharged sewage, in due course of time, is purified
by what is known as self purification process of natural
waters.
 The degree and amount of treatment given to raw sewage
before disposing it into the river depends not only upon
the quality of raw sewage but also upon the self
purification capacity of the river and the intended use of
its water.
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 Conditions for disposal by dilution
When sewage is comparatively fresh and free from
floating and settle able solids.
Where diluting waters are not used for the purpose of
navigation or water supply for at least some reasonable
distance on the downstream from the point of sewage
disposal.
When the outfall sewer of the city or the treatment plant
is situated near some natural waters having large volumes
When the diluting water (i.e. the source of disposal) has
high dissolved oxygen (DO) content.

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 2. Disposal on land for irrigation
 This method, in addition to disposing of the sewage, may
help in increasing crop yields by 33% as the sewage
generally contains a lot of fertilizing minerals and other
elements.
 However, the sewage effluent before being used as
irrigation water must be made safe.
Conditions for disposal on land for irrigation
• When some natural rivers or water courses are not
located in the vicinity,
• When irrigation water is scarcely available, the use of
sewage for irrigating crops is a good alternative.

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 continued
 The method of effluent irrigation will prove useful in
areas of low rainfall, as this will help in maintaining
good absorption capacity of the soil.
 This method of disposal of sewage, poses problems
during the periods when no irrigation water is required
for the crops especially during rains.
 This method is, therefore preferred when sewage can be
diverted to some river streams during rainy season.

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End of chapter five

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