Phosphorus Recovery from Sewage Sludge Using Acidithiobacilli

Surendra K. Pradhan, Helvi Heinonen-Tanski, Anna-Maria Veijalainen, Sirpa Peräniemi and Eila Torvinen
Additional contact information
Surendra K. Pradhan: Department of Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Eastern Finland, FI-70211 Kuopio, Finland
Helvi Heinonen-Tanski: Department of Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Eastern Finland, FI-70211 Kuopio, Finland
Anna-Maria Veijalainen: Department of Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Eastern Finland, FI-70211 Kuopio, Finland
Sirpa Peräniemi: Department of Pharmacy, University of Eastern Finland, FI-70211 Kuopio, Finland
Eila Torvinen: Department of Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Eastern Finland, FI-70211 Kuopio, Finland

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 13, 1-13

Abstract: Sewage sludge contains a significant amount of phosphorus (P), which could be recycled to address the global demand for this non-renewable, important plant nutrient. The P in sludge can be solubilized and recovered so that it can be recycled when needed. This study investigated the P solubilization from sewage sludge using Acidithiobacillus thiooxidans and Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans . The experiment was conducted by mixing 10 mL of sewage sludge with 90 mL of different water/liquid medium/inoculum and incubated at 30 °C. The experiment was conducted in three semi-continuous phases by replacing 10% of the mixed incubated medium with fresh sewage sludge. In addition, 10 g/L elemental sulfur (S) was supplemented into the medium in the third phase. The pH of the A. thiooxidans and A. ferrooxidans treated sludge solutions was between 2.2 and 6.3 until day 42. In phase 3, after supplementing with S, the pH of A. thiooxidans treated sludge was reduced to 0.9, which solubilized and extracted 92% of P. We found that acidithiobacilli supplemented with S can be used to treat sludge, i.e., achieve hygienization, removal of heavy metals, and solubilization and recovery of P.

Keywords: Acidithiobacillus thiooxidans; Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans; bioleaching; phosphorus solubilization; recovery; sewage sludge (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/13/7135/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/13/7135/ (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:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:13:p:7135-:d:587984

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

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