Removal of organic matter and ammonium from landfill leachate through different scenarios: Operational cost evaluation in a full-scale case study of a Flemish landfill

Violet Oloibiri; Michael Chys; Stijn De Wandel; Kristof Demeestere; Stijn W H Van Hulle

doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2016.09.055

Removal of organic matter and ammonium from landfill leachate through different scenarios: Operational cost evaluation in a full-scale case study of a Flemish landfill

J Environ Manage. 2017 Dec 1;203(Pt 2):774-781. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2016.09.055. Epub 2016 Sep 22.

Authors

Violet Oloibiri¹, Michael Chys², Stijn De Wandel³, Kristof Demeestere⁴, Stijn W H Van Hulle⁵

Affiliations

¹ LIWET, Department of Industrial Biological Sciences, Ghent University, Campus Kortrijk, Graaf Karel de Goedelaan 5, B-8500, Kortrijk, Belgium; EnVOC, Department of Sustainable Organic Chemistry and Technology, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium; Kenya Industrial Research and Development Institute (KIRDI), P. O. Box 30650-00100, Nairobi, Kenya.
² LIWET, Department of Industrial Biological Sciences, Ghent University, Campus Kortrijk, Graaf Karel de Goedelaan 5, B-8500, Kortrijk, Belgium; BIOMATH, Department of Mathematical Modeling, Statistics and Bioinformatics, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
³ LIWET, Department of Industrial Biological Sciences, Ghent University, Campus Kortrijk, Graaf Karel de Goedelaan 5, B-8500, Kortrijk, Belgium.
⁴ EnVOC, Department of Sustainable Organic Chemistry and Technology, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium.
⁵ LIWET, Department of Industrial Biological Sciences, Ghent University, Campus Kortrijk, Graaf Karel de Goedelaan 5, B-8500, Kortrijk, Belgium; BIOMATH, Department of Mathematical Modeling, Statistics and Bioinformatics, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium. Electronic address: stijn.vanhulle@ugent.be.

PMID: 27666646
DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2016.09.055

Abstract

Several scenarios are available to landfilling facilities to effectively treat leachate at the lowest possible cost. In this study, the performance of various leachate treatment sequences to remove COD and nitrogen from a leachate stream and the associated cost are presented. The results show that, to achieve 100% nitrogen removal, autotrophic nitrogen removal (ANR) or a combination of ANR and nitrification - denitrification (N-dN) is more cost effective than using only the N-dN process (0.58 €/m³) without changing the leachate polishing costs associated with granular activated carbon (GAC). Treatment of N-dN effluent by ozonation or coagulation led to the reduction of the COD concentration by 10% and 59% respectively before GAC adsorption. This reduced GAC costs and subsequently reduced the overall treatment costs by 7% (ozonation) and 22% (coagulation). On the contrary, using Fenton oxidation to reduce the COD concentration of N-dN effluent by 63% increased the overall leachate treatment costs by 3%. Leachate treatment sequences employing ANR for nitrogen removal followed by ozonation or Fenton or coagulation for COD removal and final polishing with GAC are on average 33% cheaper than a sequence with N-dN + GAC only. When ANR is the preceding step and GAC the final step, choice of AOP i.e., ozonation or Fenton did not affect the total treatment costs which amounted to 1.43 (ozonation) and 1.42 €/m³ (Fenton). In all the investigated leachate treatment trains, the sequence with ANR + coagulation + GAC is the most cost effective at 0.94 €/m³.

Keywords: Ammonium nitrogen; COD; Cost evaluation; Landfill leachate treatment.

MeSH terms

Adsorption
Ammonium Compounds
Denitrification
Waste Disposal Facilities*
Water Pollutants, Chemical*

Substances

Ammonium Compounds
Water Pollutants, Chemical