Impact of Magnesium Sources for Phosphate Recovery and/or Removal from Waste

Kazi Parvez Fattah, Sarah Sinno, Serter Atabay, Zahid Khan, Zahraa Al-Dawood, Alaa Kamel Yasser and Riyad Temam
Additional contact information
Kazi Parvez Fattah: Department of Civil Engineering, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah P.O. Box 26666, United Arab Emirates
Sarah Sinno: Department of Civil Engineering, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah P.O. Box 26666, United Arab Emirates
Serter Atabay: Department of Civil Engineering, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah P.O. Box 26666, United Arab Emirates
Zahid Khan: Department of Civil Engineering, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah P.O. Box 26666, United Arab Emirates
Zahraa Al-Dawood: Department of Civil Engineering, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah P.O. Box 26666, United Arab Emirates
Alaa Kamel Yasser: Department of Civil Engineering, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah P.O. Box 26666, United Arab Emirates
Riyad Temam: Department of Civil Engineering, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah P.O. Box 26666, United Arab Emirates

Energies, 2022, vol. 15, issue 13, 1-12

Abstract: As the population continues to rise, the demand for resources and environmentally friendly management of produced wastes has shown a significant increase in concern. To decrease the impact of these wastes on the environment, it is important to utilize the wastes in producing and/or recovering usable products to provide for the sustainable management of resources. One non-renewable and rapidly diminishing resource is phosphorus, which is used in several products, the most important being its use in manufacturing chemical fertilizer. With the increase in demand but reduction in availability of naturally occurring mineral phosphorus, it is important to investigate other sources of phosphorus. Phosphorus is most commonly recovered through struvite (magnesium ammonium phosphate) precipitation. The recovery of phosphorus from various wastewater has been well established and documented with recovery rates mostly above 90%. However, one of the major drawbacks of the recovery is the high cost of chemicals needed to precipitate the phosphorus. Since the external magnesium needed to achieve struvite precipitation accounts for around 75% of the total chemical cost, applicability of low-cost magnesium sources, such as bittern or seawater, can help reduce the operational cost significantly. This paper investigates the different magnesium sources that have been used for the recovery of phosphorus, highlighting the different approaches and operating conditions investigated, and their corresponding phosphorus recovery rates. An investigation of the economic aspects of the magnesium sources used for removal/recovery show that costs are dependent on the raw waste treated, the source of magnesium and the location of treatment. A review of published articles on the economics of phosphorus removal/recovery also indicates that there is a lack of studies on the economics of the treatment processes, and there is a need for a comprehensive study on life cycle assessment of such processes that go beyond the technical and economical aspects of treatment processes.

Keywords: phosphate; nutrient recovery; magnesium; reject brine; struvite (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/13/4585/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/13/4585/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:15:y:2022:i:13:p:4585-:d:845815

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().