Comparison of the Full-Scale Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant Designs Consisting of Modified Bardenpho Process with and Without Membrane Bioreactor for Nutrient Removal: Cost Analysis

Abstract

Cost estimating for wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) construction/upgrade projects is a worldwide priority and is useful for forecasting its future economic needs. On the other hand, sensitivity analysis can provide valuable information about design decisions. Nowadays, there is an increasing interest to use membrane bioreactor (MBR) for wastewater treatment. This study intends to analyze and compare the total project construction, operation labor, maintenance labor, material, chemical, energy and amortization costs of the proposed full-scale municipal WWTP configurations consisting of modified Bardenpho (5-stage biological nutrient removal) process with and without MBR for different average influent wastewater flow rates. The designs, theoretical effluents quality and costs comparison of the two WWTP configurations were reported. Results demonstrated that the application of MBR system in WWTP could result in not only higher capital cost but also higher operation and maintenance costs than conventional processes for the same average influent wastewater flow rate. In addition, the costs were enhanced with increasing the average influent wastewater flow rate.