Demand response within the energy-for-water-nexus - A review. ESRI WP637, October 2019

A promising tool to achieve more flexibility within power systems is demand re-sponse (DR). End-users in many strands of industry have been subject to research up to now regarding the opportunities for implementing DR programmes. One sector that has received little attention from the literature so far, is wastewater treatment. However, case studies indicate that the potential for wastewater treatment plants to provide DR services might be significant. This review presents and categorises recent modelling approaches for industrial demand response as well as for the wastewater treatment plant operation. Furthermore, the main sources of flexibility from wastewater treatment plants are presented: a potential for variable electricity use in aeration, the time-shifting operation of pumps, the exploitation of built-in redundan-cy in the system and flexibility in the sludge processing. Although case studies con-note the potential for DR from individual WWTPs, no study acknowledges the en-dogeneity of energy prices which arises from a large-scale utilisation of DR. There-fore, an integrated energy systems approach is required to quantify system and market effects effectively

Treatment wetlands

Treatment Wetlands is the seventh volume in the Biological Wastewater Treatment series, which gives a state-of-the-art presentation of the science and technology of sewage treatment. The major variants of wetland systems are covered in this volume, namely: (i) horizontal flow wetlands; (ii) vertical flow wetlands; (iii) French vertical flow wetlands; (iv) intensified wetlands; (v) free water surface wetlands; (vi) other applications of treatment wetlands. The book presents in a clear and didactic way the main concepts, working principles, expected performance, design criteria, design examples, construction aspects and operational guidelines. The book has been written by an international team of top experts in the field of treatment wetlands.Postprint (published version

Generation of (synthetic) influent data for performing wastewater treatment modelling studies

The success of many modelling studies strongly depends on the availability of sufficiently long influent time series - the main disturbance of a typical wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) - representing the inherent natural variability at the plant inlet as accurately as possible. This is an important point since most modelling projects suffer from a lack of realistic data representing the influent wastewater dynamics. The objective of this paper is to show the advantages of creating synthetic data when performing modelling studies for WWTPs. This study reviews the different principles that influent generators can be based on, in order to create realistic influent time series. In addition, the paper summarizes the variables that those models can describe: influent flow rate, temperature and traditional/emerging pollution compounds, weather conditions (dry/wet) as well as their temporal resolution (from minutes to years). The importance of calibration/validation is addressed and the authors critically analyse the pros and cons of manual versus automatic and frequentistic vs Bayesian methods. The presentation will focus on potential engineering applications of influent generators, illustrating the different model concepts with case studies. The authors have significant experience using these types of tools and have worked on interesting case studies that they will share with the audience. Discussion with experts at the WWTmod seminar shall facilitate identifying critical knowledge gaps in current WWTP influent disturbance models. Finally, the outcome of these discussions will be used to define specific tasks that should be tackled in the near future to achieve more general acceptance and use of WWTP influent generators

Treatment Wetlands

Overview of Treatment Wetlands; Fundamentals of Treatment Wetlands; Horizontal Flow Wetlands; Vertical Flow Wetlands; French Vertical Flow Wetlands; Intensified and Modified Wetlands; Free Water Surface Wetlands; Other Applications; Additional Aspects

Online optimal experimental re-design in robotic parallel fed-batch cultivation facilities

We present an integrated framework for the online optimal experimental re-design applied to parallel nonlinear dynamic processes that aims to precisely estimate the parameter set of macro kinetic growth models with minimal experimental effort. This provides a systematic solution for rapid validation of a specific model to new strains, mutants, or products. In biosciences, this is especially important as model identification is a long and laborious process which is continuing to limit the use of mathematical modeling in this field. The strength of this approach is demonstrated by fitting a macro-kinetic differential equation model for Escherichia coli fed-batch processes after 6 h of cultivation. The system includes two fully-automated liquid handling robots; one containing eight mini-bioreactors and another used for automated at-line analyses, which allows for the immediate use of the available data in the modeling environment. As a result, the experiment can be continually re-designed while the cultivations are running using the information generated by periodical parameter estimations. The advantages of an online re-computation of the optimal experiment are proven by a 50-fold lower average coefficient of variation on the parameter estimates compared to the sequential method (4.83% instead of 235.86%). The success obtained in such a complex system is a further step towards a more efficient computer aided bioprocess development. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2017;114: 610–619. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.BMBF, 02PJ1150, Verbundprojekt: Plattformtechnologien für automatisierte Bioprozessentwicklung (AutoBio); Teilprojekt: Automatisierte Bioprozessentwicklung am Beispiel von neuen Nukleosidphosphorylase

Sustainable Treatment and Reuse of Municipal Wastewater

In many countries, especially in developing countries, many people lack access to water and sanitation services and this inadequate service is the main cause of diseases in these countries. Application of appropriate wastewater treatment technologies, which are effective, low cost, simple to operate, proven technologies, is a key component in any strategy aimed at increasing the coverage of wastewater treatment. Sustainable Treatment and Reuse of Municipal Wastewater presents the concepts of appropriate technology for wastewater treatment and the issues of strategy and policy for increasing wastewater treatment coverage. The book focuses on the resolution of wastewater treatment and disposal problems in developing countries, however the concepts presented are valid and applicable anywhere and plants based on combined unit processes of appropriate technology can also be used in developed countries and provide to them the benefits described

Integrating Microbial Fuel Cells (MFCs) into the treatment of sulphate-rich wastewater

The use of laboratory scale Microbial Fuel Cells (MFCs) for the combined generation of electricity and the treatment of wastewater has been well documented in literature. In addition to this the integration of MFCs into wastewater treatment reactors has also been shown to have several benefits. These include the improved treatment of wastewater, reduced solid waste and the potential to offset the energy costs of the process through the generation of electricity (Du et al., 2007). The treatment of sulphate-rich wastewater, and in particular Acid Rock Drainage (ARD), has become of increasing importance in water sparse countries like South Africa where mining is currently and has taken place. A semi-passive method of continuous ARD waste treatment is currently being investigated within the Centre for Bioprocess Engineering Research (CeBER) (van Hille et al., 2015). This research involves the use of a Linear Flow Channel Reactor (LFCR) designed for combined biological sulphide reduction and sulphide oxidation to yield a sulphur product. Sulphate Reducing Bacteria (SRB) mediate the biological sulphide reduction. Chemical and biological sulphide oxidation takes place in a Floating Sulphur Biofilm (FSB) on the surface of the reactor and is mediated by Sulphide Oxidising Bacteria (SOB). Sulphate-rich wastewater can therefore be remediated through total sulphur species removal