Biofiltration has become a prominent pre-treatment process in drinking water treatment. Although ATP monitoring has been used successfully to quantify the biomass’ response to optimization measures such as nutrient supplementation and pre-oxidation, correlating these biomass changes to overall performance has been a challenge to date.
Recent research done by EVEN Ph.D. candidate Leigh Gilmore from the University of Colorado at Boulder helps fill in this gap. The finding has taken biofiltration process modelling to another level where operating parameters as well as biomass measurements using ATP analysis can now be used to mathematically predict total organic carbon (TOC) removal.
This published work, which includes an effective model for TOC removal will be presented at AWWA’s International Symposium on Biological Treatment taking place from January 27-28 in Long Beach, California.