Since the detection of perchlorate in some California groundwaters in early 1997, several studies
have evaluated multiple treatment technologies for its removal. Three treatment technologies
have proven to be technically feasible at drinking-water treatment scale: biological reduction,
ion-exchange, and reverse osmosis (RO) membranes. Although ion exchange and RO are
proven technologies for water treatment, they only concentrate perchlorate into waste streams
that require further disposal and/or treatment. On the other hand, biological reduction reduces
perchlorate to the innocuous chloride ion (Cl-) without the production of any residuals that
require special handling, which is a major advantage. This paper describes an investigation that used biological reduction in the form of a hydrogen-fed hollow-fiber membrane biofilm reactor (MBfR) for the removal of perchlorate. During initial testing, it was discovered
that a bench-scale MBfR was effective in reducing 50 to 1000 µg/L perchlorate to below the
previous California Department of Public Health Services Advisory Action Level of 18-µg/L.
At pilot-scale, the objective was to evaluate the application of a pilot-scale MBfR system to
biologically reduce low-concentration perchlorate-contaminated water from an active
groundwater well to below the previous 4 µg/L CaDHS Action Limit. Reduction of perchlorate, consumption of hydrogen, operation and maintenance, removal of other compounds, and hydraulic modeling are all discussed. Includes tables, figures.
| Edition : | Vol. - No. |
| File Size : | 1
file
, 4 MB |
| Note : | This product is unavailable in Ukraine, Russia, Belarus |
| Number of Pages : | 6 |
| Published : | 06/17/2004 |
