Treatment of acidic sulfate-containing wastewater using revolving algae biofilm reactors: Sulfur removal performance and microbial community characterization

Bioresource Technology
Haoyuan ZhouZhiyou Wen

Abstract

Industries such as mining operations are facing challenges of treating sulfur-containing wastewater such as acid mine drainage (AMD) generated in their plant. The aim of this work is to evaluate the use of a revolving algal biofilm (RAB) reactor to treat AMD with low pH (3.5-4) and high sulfate content (1-4 g/L). The RAB reactors resulted in sulfate removal efficiency up to 46% and removal rate up to 0.56 g/L-day, much higher than those obtained in suspension algal culture. The high-throughput sequencing revealed that the RAB reactor contained diverse cyanobacteria, green algae, diatoms, and acid reducing bacteria that contribute the sulfate removal through various mechanisms. The RAB reactors also showed a superior performance of COD, ammonia and phosphorus removal. Collectively, the study demonstrated that RAB-based process is an effective method to remove sulfate in wastewater with small footprint and can be potentially installed in municipal or industrial wastewater treatment facilities.

Citations

Jul 11, 2019·Water Environment Research : a Research Publication of the Water Environment Federation·Xinchao WeiRobert W Dengler
Nov 13, 2019·Water Environment Research : a Research Publication of the Water Environment Federation·Juan PengZhiyou Wen
Jul 7, 2020·Engineering in Life Sciences·Felix WollmannFelix Krujatz
Apr 24, 2021·Environmental Science & Technology·Yuan LinHongqiang Ren
Sep 7, 2019·The Science of the Total Environment·Guoqiang ZhaoQunqun Liu

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