Abstract
Abstract This research was undertaken in order to clarify some of the apparent inconsistencies in the literature concerning the fate of phosphates in iron phosphate sludges during anaerobic digestion. Three anaerobic batch reactors were started and acclimatized to a feed of waste activated sludge. While one digester was maintained as a control, with a feed of only biological sludge, the other two digesters were loaded with different mixtures of biological sludge and iron phosphate sludge. When the digesters had stabilized with respect to influent and effluent total phosphorus, critical measurements of all the phosphorus fractions were made. The soluble phosphorus in the control digester remained the same from the influent to the effluent. This observation seems to contradict the expected increase in soluble phosphates during the anaerobic digestion process. When the activated sludge was mixed with the ferric phosphate sludge, it was observed that a reduction in soluble phosphorus took place. After this combined biological-chemical sludge had been digested anaerobically, an increase in the soluble phosphorus concentration, to a level roughly equivalent to that in the biological component of the influent, was observed.
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