Statistical correlation analysis and energy consumption of electrically-enhanced membrane bioreactor for wastewater treatment

In this paper, the dependence of total dissolved solids (TDS) and turbidity of influent and effluent streams on the properties of a submerged membrane bioreactor integrated with electrokinetic treatment for raw municipal wastewater treatment was investigated. The relationship between the mixed liquor suspended solids (MLSS) and other reactor properties was also studied. Furthermore, the specific energy consumption of the set-up and cost of water treatment were estimated. It was observed that soluble phosphorus, pH, and carbon oxygen demand (COD) were mostly correlated with the TDS of the feed while the effluent TDS was more sensitive to total nitrogen (TN), pH, ammonium-ni-trogen (NH₄ ⁺ –N) and soluble fraction of COD. The turbidity of the wastewater and treated effluent correlated well with the nitrogen species while MLSS showed high correlation with aluminum phosphate concentration. The multiple R, R² and adjusted R² obtained for the MLSS regression analysis were 0.9, 0.9 and 0.9, respectively. The system’s specific energy consumption and cost were obtained as 0.87 kWhm^–3 and USD 0.06 m^–3, respectively. This study shows the correlation or relationship between the measured properties in wastewater treatment.