Basic methods and treatment processes of wastewater treatment

Published Time:

2025-04-03

This document provides a basic introduction to environmentally friendly water treatment, focusing on the purpose and basic methods of wastewater treatment.

  This document provides a basic introduction to environmentally friendly water treatment, focusing on the purpose and basic methods of wastewater treatment. With the rapid development of industry and improvement in people's living standards, water quality degradation makes wastewater treatment increasingly urgent.

  Wastewater Treatment

  What is the purpose of wastewater treatment?

  The purpose of wastewater treatment is to separate pollutants from wastewater through certain methods, or to decompose them into harmless and stable substances, thus purifying the wastewater. Generally, this involves preventing infection from toxins and bacteria, avoiding visible objects with unpleasant odors or appearances, to meet various usage requirements.

  What are the basic methods of wastewater treatment?

  Based on the working principles of wastewater treatment methods, they can be divided into three types: physical methods, biological methods, and chemical methods:

  1. Physical methods: These methods use physical actions to separate insoluble substances from wastewater without altering their chemical properties. Commonly used methods include gravity separation, centrifugal separation, reverse osmosis, and flotation. Pollutants in wastewater are treated, separated, and recovered using physical actions.

  2. Biological methods: These methods utilize the metabolic functions of microorganisms to decompose and oxidize dissolved or colloidal organic matter in wastewater into stable inorganic matter, thus purifying the wastewater. Commonly used methods include activated sludge methods and biofilm methods. Biological treatment is more effective than physical treatment.

  3. Chemical methods: These methods utilize chemical reactions to treat or recover dissolved or colloidal substances in wastewater, often used for industrial wastewater. Commonly used methods include coagulation, neutralization, oxidation-reduction, and ion exchange. Chemical treatment methods are highly effective but costly, often used as a further treatment step after biological treatment to improve effluent water quality.

  1. Acid-base wastewater treatment process

  Acid-base wastewater is a relatively rare type of wastewater solution. The mass fraction of acid in wastewater varies greatly, ranging from less than 1% to over 10%. Acid-base wastewater is highly corrosive and must undergo appropriate wastewater treatment before discharge. For the treatment of acid-base wastewater, neutralization treatment should be considered first for economic reasons. The neutralizing solution should first consider the wastewater solution standard of waste-to-waste treatment.

  2. Fluoride-containing wastewater treatment process

  Precipitation is one of the most commonly used methods for treating high-concentration fluoride-containing wastewater. It involves adding chemical reagents or other agents to cause fluoride precipitation or flocculation, achieving removal through solid-liquid separation. The dissolution effect of the precipitation method is determined by the chemical reagents, reaction conditions, and solid-liquid separation.

  Chemical precipitation is mainly used for high-concentration fluoride-containing wastewater solutions, employing the calcium salt precipitation method, namely the lime precipitation method. By adding chemical substances such as calcium salts to the wastewater, calcium ions react with fluoride ions to form CaF2 precipitate, thereby removing F- from the wastewater. This process is simple, convenient, and low-cost, but it also has some drawbacks.

  3. Organic wastewater treatment process

  The characteristic of organic wastewater is its high concentration of organic matter. COD in some cases exceeds 2000mg/L, some even reaching tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of mg/L; high chroma, unpleasant odor. Some wastewater is dispersedly collected, has a pungent smell, has a bad impact on the surrounding environment, and has strong acidity or alkalinity.