Proceedings

Autotrophic nitrogen removal is commercially applied to treat ammonia rich digestate from the side stream of water resource recovery facilities (WRRFs) however its broader adoption is challenged by process complexity and inefficient oxygen transfer. ZeeNAMMOX is a new solution that overcomes these challenges by leveraging the counter-diffusion benefits of membrane aerated biofilm reactor (MABR) technology to enable a resilient and energy efficient partial nitritation and anammox (PN/A) process.

One pilot employing this solution was operated to treat digestate to demonstrate reliable partial nitritation in an MABR biofilm with ammonia oxidation rates of 4.6 g-N d^-1 m^-2. After 8 months of operation this pilot saw total nitrogen removal of 30% and upon visual inspection anammox bacteria was discovered throughout the reactor. After 8 months of total operation the pilot maintains stable TN removal, nitritation, and demostrates the potential for the ZeeNAMMOX solution as a resilient and low-energy PN/A alternative to existing solutions with energy savings of 55%.