Nitrogen in wastewater and more real world results

I spend quite a bit of time on this blog discussing nitrogen in wastewater and thought I would take a minute and explain a little about the species of nitrogen present in domestic wastewater.  

Nitrogen is present in wastewater in several forms:

Organic nitrogen, primarily as urea.  Urea is the end product of the metabolism of nitrogen-containing compounds in most mammals and is excreted in the urine (Solomons 1988)

Urea

Ammonia:  Ammonia is generated by ammonification of urea.  You can see the amino groups (NH2) in the urea that degrade to ammonia. (Grady, Daigger and Lim, 1999)

Ammonia (NH3)

If the pH of the wastewater is neutral to acidic the ammonia will be in the form of ammonium.

Ammonium Ion

Nitrate and Nitrite: The ammonium is converted to nitrite and then nitrate in the presence of oxygen.

Nitrate (NO3)

Nitrite (NO2)

Those are the main forms of nitrogen in domestic wastewater.  Total nitrogen (TN) is the sum of all species:

Total nitrogen (TN) = Organic nitrogen (urea) + Ammonia/Ammonium + Nitrate + Nitrite.

You may have heard of Total Kjeldahl Nitrogen (TKN), this is not TN.  TKN is the sum of organic nitrogen (urea) + ammonia/ammonium.  TKN can be equal to TN if no nitrate or nitrite is present in the sample.  TKN cannot be greater than TN.  With the definition of TKN, total nitrogen can be expressed as: 

TN = TKN + nitrate +nitrite.

I spoke with an onsite maintenance provider who maintained a competing system and was responsible for collecting wastewater samples for analysis.  He was very proud of the fact that the total nitrogen for his systems was under 20 mg/L and felt the need to prove it to me by showing me a copy of his sample results.  The nitrogen analysis he was having run by the lab, however, was for total kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN) not total nitrogen (TN).  He heard the word, "total" in TKN and assumed he was getting the correct sample analysis.  The problem was that once the nitrate and nitrite were added to the results, to obtain a true TN value, his systems were actually exceeding the state standard by a huge margin.  You can see it is important to understand what you are doing.

This brings up an interesting point.  We have all heard of Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) and most know that BOD is a measure of the amount of oxygen required to oxidize biologically degradable compounds completely to water and carbon dioxide.  The most common form of this test measures the dissolved oxygen concentration remaining in a sample over a period of 5 days, hence the BOD5 test.   What you will see fairly often are manufacturers presenting cBOD as BOD5.  a cBOD test is a different test though. 

In a cBOD test, the bacteria responsible for converting ammonia to nitrate and nitrite are killed. This effectively negates the oxygen demand imposed by the nitrogen species.  The cBOD test provides useful information but should not be confused with the standard BOD5 test.  I think manufacturers use cBOD because if you collect a sample from a treatment system and analyze it for BOD5 and cBOD5 you will see that the cBOD5 sample produces a lower value.  The reason the value is lower is because a significant portion of the oxygen-demanding species have been negated by killing the microorganisms that are responsible for oxidizing it.  


Real World, Cold Weather Results (Not Waco in the summer)

I am including some recent Eliminite samples from five residential systems in Montana.  These are cold weather samples taken from standard residential systems.  The nitrogen results represents an 80 to 90% removal.

Lot	Total Nitrogen	BOD
22	14	18
26	14	17
28	15	17
29	10	11
32	17	11
Average	14.00	14.80

 

Montana has had a long cold winter this year but as the results show, these values are superior to most systems best warm weather data.   Our nitrogen numbers are not the only values that are much lower than competing onsite systems; our prices are significantly lower also.  It's just a fact.

Highway Rest Areas
I'll be discussing the highway rest area systems in a day or two.  We are currently achieving about a 90% removal of nitrogen.  The influent nitrogen is a little higher than previously thought;  400 to 500 mg/L TN and the BOD is over 1000 mg/L.  We don't even have the system dialed in yet and are currently removing 93% TN.   Oh...these are cold weather results also!


Blog Traffic
Should I mention what company has visited this blog more in the last month than anyone...even me!?  If you guys would like to buy some systems, we can work something out.

More Real World Results

A few years ago sand filters were being presented, very effectively I must add, by a company that manufactured sand filter kits, as a panacea that would solve the world's onsite wastewater treatment problems.  Engineers, contractors and regulators were offered "classes" in a traveling side show of sorts providing them everything they needed to specify, permit and build God's gift to mankind's need to treat onsite wastewater. 

Detailed gradation curves describing the size and composition of the sand were developed and distributed giving the illusion that a lot of hard thought went into the design of these sand filters. I remember the pages of plans that were made available to engineers so that they could simply make copies and insert them into their plan set.  Sand filters were sold as easy to install, easy to maintain, reliable and inexpensive. 

There were many problems with sand filters that resulted in them being a nightmare to install, impossible to maintain, expensive and when they failed....they went all at once.

In my opinion one first must look at the treatment media.  Sand works great, right up to the point where it doesn't.  Then you have this mess to deal with:

Any media with tiny pore spaces is far more likely to clog when wastewater is applied than media with large pore spaces. 

There was a poster presentation at a NOWRA conference a few years ago relating hydraulic conductivity of the media to clogging potential.  It was shown, and this should not come as a surprise, that low hydraulic conductivity media had a much greater probability of failing due to biological fouling than media with higher hydraulic conductivity. 

During a recent presentation, Tchobanoglous stated that the size of the particles in the wastewater being applied had a significant effect on the bio-fouling potential of the media.  If the particle size is close to the media pore size...clogging is likely.  This explains, in part, why manufacturers are requiring larger and larger primary tanks and recirculation tanks for their systems; to try to reduce the size of the suspended solids so their media does not foul.

The sand filter shown above has already been rebuilt and the owners have decided to install an Eliminite system in its place.  Our MetaRocks media has been proven over time and hundreds of installations to reduce the potential for biological clogging to near zero.  The extreme efficiency of the media allows us to use smaller and fewer tanks while dramatically improving reliability and treatment characteristics. 

Hydraulic acceptance rate of MetaRocks:  >250 gal/min/ft^2. 

Our goal has been to identify aspects of an onsite treatment system critical to its performance and optimize those aspects.  The fundamental starting point is the media.  If the media is not right, the system either will not work, or it will be a maintenance nightmare. 

Highly robust media allows the system operation to be varied and optimized because there is no concern that the media will be overloaded.  This fact leads to a variety of possible configurations and allows the designer to target constituents in the wastewater for treatment.  Rather than treating the system with kid gloves, it handles dynamic conditions to the point of abuse.  Isn't that what you really want in an onsite system?

We just received several Montana Cold Winter sample results for nitrogen, total nitrogen........The "worst" result was 12 mg/L TN.  Montana cold, dead of winter, inspection not maintenance, no telephone link, just great results.  

The best?...it was 4 mg/L TN.

If you need serious nitrogen removal....

Don't monkey around! 

Hidden camera catches monkey wiring control panel

These are cold weather results from a real Eliminite system serving a small restaurant.  And, it does not have a phone line connected to it. 

That whole phone line thing has real Big Brother feel to me anyway....Think about it.  Like, do they know how many times you use the toilet?  Or how long you stay in the shower? Is there anything in your home that is gathering and sending personal data night and day to some unknown person somewhere? 

Don't we generally refer to that as spyware, phishing, a virus?  Eavesdropping.....how about an invasion of your privacy?

Eliminite is more reliable, has better results and is less expensive.   And, we respect your privacy.

More Real-World Eliminite Results

"Blind Samples" samples were collected by State Officials from three systems on the same day.  All three are single family residences in similar locations and have been in use for several years.  System N and System F both have NSF 40 and 245. Which system has the best total nitrogen results? 

System N effluent contains TWICE the nitrogen as the Eliminite system and System F effluent has THREE TIMES the nitrogen as the Eliminite.  This is not a one time occurrence, Eliminite consistently beats the others.  Keep in mind, these tests were taken in warm weather....once the temperature falls a bit, N and F results degrade steeply.  A recent cold weather (January in Montana) sample from a single family residence on Montana:  13 mg/L total nitrogen.  Even our inexpensive standard residential models in the long bitter cold of Montana winters run around 12-15 mg/L total nitrogen.  If you need it, we can easily obtain single digit results. Consistently and reliably.

Capital cost for all three are close but I have seen cost estimates for the others and we even beat them on price.  Electrical costs for the other two are probably 5-8 times higher than Eliminite and our systems require far less maintenance. 

So why are the other companies so big and well known?  One word:  Lobbyists.  They all have government relations departments that push and manipulate the regs to favor their particular stinkbox.  Just look it up on their websites.   Eliminite out performs most onsite systems and, if you factor in cost, it may be the best value in onsite treatment technology available, but we are at a competitive disadvantage because we don't have a team of lobbyists providing favors to the gullible government officials they were able to inveigle with their silver tongues.

I am working on obtaining an approval in Maryland (they have HUGE onsite problems there which are not being helped by the fact that the state is forced to water down their regs because the approved systems cannot meet the standards).  I was informed that the manufacturers of the existing systems there would likely sue the state if we were even allowed in for an test run.  Sounds like the work of lobbyists to me. 

In Montana, System N and F, last time I looked, do not have a single installation that even comes close to meeting our liberal standard of 24 mg/L TN. Not one.  In fact, most of the really fancy filter fabric contraptions can't meet that standard either (This leads to monkeying around with the samples so they can claim a 60% reduction in TN.  If I user their numbers for influent strength, Eliminite generally obtains an 80-90% reduction in nitrogen......you guys can't beat us so put on some dry  "huggies", change the sheets and stop your whining.)  

If you are tired of hearing all their excuses about high cost, paying dearly for inferior results, putting up with all the maintenance expense, the smell, the noise, high electric bills, I you have "seven tons of toxic peat moss" rotting in your yard (I'll write more about that later. you can take a look at Leesburg Today 7/19/07 if you are interested), if "fluffing" little foam croutons sounds stupid to you too, if you can't stand having those guys in your backyard hosing off  fish tank filters full of feculent feces, if pumping sewage on sandboxes just does not seem to make sense, you can call or write to me, I'll tell it like it is.  I want to show you real world results that come from reliable designs and expert engineering.  I can show you our system that is biologically complex and mechanically simple. (Thanks to my good friend Richard for that line).  Whatever you do, don't commit intellectual suicide by swallowing anything these guys try to feed you without questioning it.  Ask them how their system compares to Eliminite and watch them pucker up...or say, "Oh..I never heard of them."   They have heard of us...they just don't want YOU to hear of us.

Green Plastic Tanks and Pipes Everywhere

I took a photo of a system that made me laugh.  It's one of those "pod" types with lots of green plastic tanks and pipes everywhere.  In fact, in the photo, you can't even tell which pipes go to which tanks.  The system was pretty large and I couldn't get all of in the photo.  But, it really paints a picture of what is wrong with this industry.  Now, I am going out on a limb here, and you will probably recognize the manufacturer, but hey, this is the world wide web and people have a right to know and a right to see these kinds of contraptions. You may even recognize the people in the picture.  The photo is below.

I gotcha', didn't I?    But you already had a picture in your mind...

Great Article--worth the time!

I couldn't have said it better myself:

Entrepreneurs Under Attack

"Every day, federal, state, and local governments stifle small businesses to privilege well-connected incumbent companies. It's a system of protectionism for influential insiders who don't want competition."

First Sample 98% Nitrification, Second Sample 80% Reduction in TOTAL Nitrogen

I wrote about the highway rest area wastewater treatments systems we designed and built for the Montana Department of Transportation (MDT).  (MDT made a determination that it was in the best interest of the public that Eliminite be the sole source provider of wastewater treatment systems for all its facilities.  This "Public Interest Finding" was approved by the Federal Highway Administration.) 

This particular WWTS was started in the winter and, at this location, it gets cold and stays cold.  We collected a sample in January which showed that even in the extreme cold, the system was providing about 98% ammonia conversion to nitrate. 

We collected the second sample a week ago and found that the systems nitrogen removal was already at 80%.   I expect the Nitrogen levels to continue to fall.

This is excellent treatment considering the high nitrogen concentration of the incoming wastewater.  In fact, we are already operating better, with a cold weather startup, than most "advanced" systems receiving residential wastewater.  (take a look at the "Best Available Technology" data from an NSF 245 system I posted a few weeks ago.)

Here is some icing on the cake.....No alarms, no failures, no problems. We started the system and it has been operating perfectly.  No media to wash off...no cubes to fluff.

Yes.  This has really irritated the peddlers of competing systems.  You can imagine the incessant puling and crying.  They are even trying to have the PIF rescinded.  The fact is, we received the job through a fair bidding process.  Eliminite came in tens of thousands of dollars less and we were awarded BOTH jobs saving the taxpayers tons of money AND using local suppliers to the max.  But they have friends in high places...so the hell with the best interest of the taxpayers. 

I did have to point out some shenanigans with one vendor however.  The peddler sort of ignored the engineers design flow and submitted his proposal with a system that was 1/3 of what the  manufacturer would require.  I guess he figured that he would spring the news on the taxpayers later.   My guess is they would have blamed the upgraded system on the Department of Environmental Quality.   I pointed this little "oversight" out to the contractor and he asked the vendor for a system meeting the engineers design requirements.  You can guess what happened next,  the correctly designed system was much more expensive than the Eliminite system and Eliminite won the job.  Oh...but the whining....I would bet there isn't a single pair of dry big boy "Huggies" in their entire organization!  Wait until they find out that we just beat them on a school wastewater treatment system yesterday.

I am always happy to discuss how our little Montana company is able to provide system that out perform the others.  So give me a call...fire off an email.