2019_EJRNL_PP_SARAH_E__KEITHLEY_1.pdf
Terbatas Lili Sawaludin Mulyadi
» ITB
Terbatas Lili Sawaludin Mulyadi
» ITB
: Drinking water biofilters can improve water
quality by transforming contaminants or their precursors, but
they also can develop headloss more rapidly than do abiotic
filters. Phosphorus supplementation has been proposed as one
strategy to lengthen biofilter run times, but the impact of this
strategy in field tests has been mixed. The current bench-scale
study found that severe phosphorus limitation, as indicated by
a high phosphatase to total glycosidase activity ratio
(PHO:GLY), led to 230% higher headloss accumulation rate
when particles were loaded onto the biofilters as compared to
the same experiment performed under a mild phosphorus
limitation. Phosphorus limitation was associated with higher
concentrations of extracellular polymeric substances, lower
biomass concentrations, a more filamentous biofilm morphology, and increased relative abundance of Hyphomicrobiaceae (a
family of stalked bacteria) on the biofilter media. These differences in the biofilm likely contributed to higher headloss. This
work suggests that phosphorus supplementation could improve biofilter hydraulics in the field if the biofilter is severely
phosphorus limited, which was indicated by a PHO:GLY greater than 154 under the conditions tested in this study.