Conversion of lignocellulosic waste into effective flocculants: synthesis, characterization, and performance

Development of cationic flocculants from lignocellulosic wastes not only eliminates the health and environmental concerns associated with the use of conventional chemicals, but also is the way of waste valorization. In the present study, cellulose fibers extracted from rice husk were cationized through an optimization method based on response surface methodology. The fibers cationized at the optimal conditions had a zeta-potential of 15.2 ± 1.0 mV, while the highest potential was + 8.76 mV, for the samples developed before optimization. FTIR analysis proved the presence of the corresponding functional groups. The functionalized fibers were biodegradable and had absolutely positive surface charges at a broad pH range. The cationized fibers were employed as a flocculant to remove turbidity from the synthetic wastewaters at various pHs and initial turbidities. The cationic fibers showed the excellent turbidity removals up to 98.5% from the synthetic wastewater without the need for conventional coagulants. In contrast to traditionally cationized fibers, the synthesized flocculants did not affect the effluent color during coagulation–flocculation. The charge neutralization and bridging through adsorption were the governing mechanisms of flocculation. The procedure can be applied on lignocellulosic wastes to develop cationic fibers with the excellent flocculation ability and suitable operational characteristics.

Conversion of Lignocellulosic Waste Into Effective Flocculants: Synthesis, Characterization, and Performance

Development of cationic flocculants from lignocellulosic wastes not only eliminates the health and environmental concerns associated with the use of conventional chemicals but also is the way of waste valorization. In the present study, cellulose fibers extracted from rice husk were cationized through an optimization method based on Response Surface Methodology. The fibers cationized at the optimal conditions had a zeta potential of 15.2±1.0 mV, which was 1.73-fold higher than that of the preliminary experiments. FTIR analysis proved the presence of the corresponding functional groups. The functionalized fibers were biodegradable and had absolutely positive surface charges at a broad pH range. The cationized fibers were employed as a flocculant to remove turbidity from the synthetic wastewaters at various pHs and initial turbidities. The cationic fibers showed the excellent turbidity removals up to 98.5% from the synthetic wastewater without the need for conventional coagulants. In contrast to traditionally cationized fibers, the synthesized flocculants did not affect the effluent color during coagulation-flocculation. The charge neutralization and bridging through adsorption were the governing mechanisms of flocculation. The procedure can be applied on lignocellulosic wastes to develop cationic fibers with the excellent flocculation ability and suitable operational characteristics.

Bio-Flocculation Property Analyses of Oleaginous Microalgae Auxenochlorella protothecoides UTEX 2341

The bio-flocculation ability of UTEX 2341 was studied for the purpose of improving microalgae harvesting efficiency to cut the high cost of biofuel production. The algae cells of UTEX 2341 cultured under heterotrophic and municipal wastewater conditions were found to have better self-flocculation ability, with flocculation rates of 92% and 85% at 2 h, respectively. Moreover, the flocculation rates of 16 freeze-dried microalgae powder samples cultured under different stress conditions were 0~72% with an algae powder dosage of 35 mg L−1. The flocculation efficiency of DIM, DCd1, DT28, and L6S was stable under different pH of 3~9 and temperatures of 15~50 °C. For samples of IM, LCd0.6, LMn2, and LZn2, the flocculation efficiency decreased or increased respectively with increased pH or temperatures. Though the flocculation properties of the eight samples showed wide differences, their flocculant compositions were almost the same with unknown components occupying large proportions. More studies needed to be further carried out to reveal the flocculation mechanisms and analyze the flocculation abilities in practical application, which would be conducive to future large-scale application of the bio-flocculation method and also cost reduction.

A novel polyamidine-grafted carboxymethylcellulose: Synthesis, characterization and flocculation performance test

This study facilitates the synthesis process of a novel graft copolymer (flocculant) using carboxymethyl cellulose, acrylonitrile and N-vinyl formamide as raw materials. The carboxymethyl cellulose graft polyamidine (CMC-g-PAMD) can be used as new flocculant to replace the traditional polyacrylamide flocculant, which manifested its excellent flocculation and degradation efficiency. A five-membered cyclic copolymer was prepared by the graft copolymerization, and the synthesized flocculants were characterized by EA, TG-DTG, FT-IR, SEM and NMR, confirming the successful synthesis of the desired copolymers. The operation conditions for copolymerization were experimentally investigated, and the results indicated that the optimal initiator dosage, copolymerization temperature, amidinization temperature, acidification time and flocculant dosage were 4 g/L, 50°C, 90°C, 3 h and 60 mg/L, respectively. Compared with the traditional polyacrylamide flocculant, the CMC-g-PAMD presented an outstanding flocculation ability of 96.1% under its optimal operation conditions, which showed an enormous potential in the application of coalmine waste-water treatment.

Backwashing Sludge Utilization of Biological Aerated Filter (BAF)

The characteristics of biological aerated filter (BAF) backwashing sludge and the combined coagulation efficiency of chemical coagulant and biological sludge, and the properties of the settled sludge produced in the utilization process were investigated. The results showed that the backwashing sludge had preferable biological flocculation ability. A promising treatment performance, which sufficed the influent requirement of BAF was observed whether by using the backwashing sludge or combined using chemical coagulant and biological sludge in the enhanced domestic wastewater pretreatment process. The removal efficiency of COD, SS and TP were up to 74.6%、81.9% and 84.2% respectively where as backwashing sludge dosage was 38~76mg and FeCl3 dosage was 30mg per liter domestic wastewater.