A METHOD OF MEASURING THE DEGREE OF ORGANIC MATTER DEGRADABILITY

A method has been proposed to determine the degree of degradability of any organic material based on the kinetics of its hydrolysis in H2SO4 of the concentration 11.5 mol.l-1 at a temperature of 108 °C. The result and the measure of degradability degree are the rate constant of hydrolytic reaction and the carbon percentage of unhydrolyzable residue in total carbon of the sample

Modified Biochar—A Tool for Wastewater Treatment

Global deposits of concentrated phosphates, which are a necessary source for the production of phosphate fertilizers, are limited. These reserves keep getting thinner, and every day, large amounts of phosphorus end up in watercourses. In this study, we verified that modified biochar (saturated with FeCl3 solution and then neutralized with NaOH solution) can adsorb significant amounts of phosphorus from wastewater. Moreover, the agrochemical qualities of sludge water from a municipal wastewater treatment plant, struvite, phosphorus-saturated biochar, and iron(III) phosphate from a reused biochar filter were tested in this study. We determined the amount of mobile phosphorus as well as the amount of extractable phosphorus and its five fractions. It was found that modified biochar can hold one-third of the phosphorus amount contained in the commonly used agricultural fertilizer simple superphosphate (1 × 105 g of modified biochar captures up to 2.79 × 103 g of P). Moreover, plants can more easily access phosphorus biochar fractions than struvite, which is formed spontaneously during sludge management. The results of this research prove that the proposed method of recycling phosphorus from wastewater can be applied in technological practice