SEWAGE TREATMENT IN RURAL AREAS BY MODIFIED BIO TOWER FOR PREVENTING ITS DISPOSAL EFFECT ON GROUND WATER POLLUTION

Abstract

With the increasing importance of environmental pollution control and the value of water shortage in the whole world, the interest started to be noticeable in the developing countries. The big funds and land areas required affected the distribution of the use of wastewater treatment in these countries. These reasons led the scientific researchers to concentrate on the use of local products, by-products, or wastes for new modified wastewater treatment techniques suitable for each country conditions. Also, the concentration on minimizing of power consumption, maintenance requirements, complicated techniques and imported equipment became one of the main targets for the ongoing studies. This leads to choose the attached growth system to decrease the required land, minimize the construction and operation cost as possible. This study was carried out to check the possibility of applying biological tower filters with new recycled plastic media under Egyptian circumstances. A field continuous flow pilot plant running for one-year period was conducted to achieve the study objectives. The study resulted in removal rates ranged between 60 to 85% for TSS, 57 to 83% for BODs and 50 to 84 % for COD. Average values of 70% for TSS, 62% for BODs and 61% for COD were maintained. These values proved the success of the new plastic media, which was made of recycled PVC crushed water bottles, to achieve almost the same results as fabricated plastic media. The study resulted in a modified design equation of the bio -tower: E = 1001[1 + 0.0326 (2.7VF/ 5 This equation decreases the required volume for the bio-tower media. The study, also, proved the success of the bio-tower system as the designed pilot plant, to decrease the required area of this type of plants by 60% and the construction costs by 50%. The study ensured the applicability of the recycled plastic as filter media and the suitability of the bio-tower treatment procedure for Egyptian wastewater treatment for high organic loads.