Partition of volatile organic compounds in activated sludge and wastewater

The Henry's law constant is important in the gas-liquid mass transfer process. Apparent dimensionless Henry's law constant, or the gas-liquid partition coefficient (K'(H)), for both hydrophilic (methanol, isopropyl alcohol, and acetone) and hydrophobic (toluene and p-xylene) organic compounds in deionized (DI) water, a wastewater with a maximum total dissolved organic carbon (DOC) content of 700 mg/L, and DI water mixed with a maximum activated sludge suspended solid (SS) concentration of 40,000 mg/L were measured using the single equilibrium technique at 293 K. Experimental results demonstrate that the K'(H), of any of the test volatile organic compounds varied among three situations. First, the K'(H), of the hydrophilic compounds in mixed liquor with the maximum SS concentration was 9-21% higher than those in DI water. Second, those for toluene and p-xylene were 77% and 93% lower, respectively, in the mixed liquor with the maximum SS concentration. Third, the K'(H), values of all of the test compounds in the wastewater were only 10% lower than those in DI water. A model was developed to relate K'(H), with wastewater DOC and the SS concentration in the activated sludge using an organic carbon-water partition coefficient and activated sludge-water partition coefficient as model parameters. The model was verified and model parameters for test compounds estimated.