Improved biological nitrogen removal resulting from the integrated treatment of wastewater and municipal waste

At present the wastewater treatment plant of Fusina (Venice) can meet the standard prescribed for nitrate concentration in the final effluent discharging to the Lagoon only by adding significant amounts of external easily biodegradable carbonaceous source (mixtures of alcohols and/or fatty acids). This paper examines the potential for using readily biodegradable COD obtained from acidogenic fermentation of the source collected organic fraction of municipal solid waste as electron donor for denitrification. Experiments were carried out by using a pilot-scale Sequencing Batch Reactor fed with the same wastewater as at Fusina plant.The results show a remarkable improvement both in denitrification rate and flexibility of the response to influent load peaks. Additional advantages of the integrated approach are the savings due to the exclusion of an expensive external carbonaceous source and to the diversion of the stream of solid waste from landfilling.