Paul Slatter

Rheological characterisation of municipal sludge: A review

Sustainable sludge management is becoming a major issue for wastewater treatment plants due to increasing urban populations and tightening environmental regulations for conventional sludge disposal methods. To address this problem, a good understanding of sludge behaviour is vital to improve and optimize the current state of wastewater treatment operations. This paper provides a review of the recent experimental works in order for researchers to be able to develop a reliable characterization technique for measuring the important properties of sludge such as viscosity, yield stress, thixotropy, and viscoelasticity and to better understand the impact of solids concentrations, temperature, and water content on these properties. In this context, choosing the appropriate rheological model and rheometer is also important.

The rheological behaviour of anaerobic digested sludge

Producing biogas energy from the anaerobic digestion of wastewater sludge is one of the most challenging tasks facing engineers, because they are dealing with vast quantities of fundamentally scientifically poorly understood and unpredictable materials; while digesters need constant flow properties to operate efficiently. An accurate estimate of sludge rheological properties is required for the design and efficient operation of digestion, including mixing and pumping. In this paper, we have determined the rheological behaviour of digested sludge at different concentrations, and highlighted common features. At low shear stress, digested sludge behaves as a linear viscoelastic solid, but shear banding can occur and modify the apparent behaviour. At very high shear stress, the behaviour fits well to the Bingham model. Finally, we show that the rheological behaviour of digested sludge is qualitatively the same at different solids concentrations, and depends only on the yield stress and Bingham viscosity, both parameters being closely linked to the solids concentration.

Clear model fluids to emulate the rheological properties of thickened digested sludge

Optimising flow processes in wastewater treatment plants requires that designers and operators take into account the flow properties of the sludge. Moreover, due to increasingly more stringent conditions on final disposal avenues such as landfill, composting, incineration etc., practitioners need to produce safer sludge in smaller quantities. Anaerobic digestion is a key treatment process for solids treatment and pathogen reduction. Due to the inherent opacity of sludge, it is impossible to visualise the mixing and flow patterns inside an anaerobic digester. Therefore, choosing an appropriate transparent model fluid which can mimic the rheological behaviour of sludge is imperative for visualisation of the hydrodynamic functioning of an anaerobic digester. Digested sludge is a complex material with time dependent non-Newtonian thixotropic characteristics. In steady state, it can be modelled by a basic power-law. However, for short-time processes the Herschel-Bulkley model can be used to model liquid-like properties. The objective of this study was to identify transparent model fluids which will mimic the behaviour of real sludge. A comparison of three model fluids, Carboxymethyl Cellulose (CMC), Carbopol gel and Laponite clay revealed that these fluids could each model certain aspects of sludge behaviour. It is concluded that the rheological behaviour of sludge can be modelled using CMC in steady state flow at high shear rates, Carbopol gel for short-time flow processes and Laponite clay suspension where time dependence is dominant.

The viscoelastic behaviour of raw and anaerobic digested sludge: Strong similarities with soft-glassy materials

Over the last few decades, municipal and industrial wastewater treatment activities have been confronted with a dramatically increasing flow of sewage sludge. To improve treatment efficiency, process and material parameters are needed but engineers are dealing with vast quantities of fundamentally poorly understood and unpredictable material Thus, accurate prediction of critically important, but analytically elusive process parameters is unattainable and is a matter of grave concern. Because engineers need reliable flow properties to simulate the process, this work is an attempt to approach sludge rheological behaviour with well-known materials which have similar characteristics. Sludge liquid-like behaviour is already well documented so, we have focused mainly on the solid-like behaviour of both raw and digested sludge by performing oscillatory measurements in the linear and non-linear regimes. We have shown that the viscoelastic behaviour of sludge presents strong similarities with soft-glassy materials but differences can be observed between raw and digested sludge. Finally, we confirm that colloidal glasses and emulsions may be used to model the rheological behaviour of raw and anaerobic digested sludge.

Experimental procedure and database for non-Newtonian open channel flow

Unlike Newtonian open channel flow, not much work has been done to study the flow behaviour of non-Newtonian fluids in open channels.A scarcity of water worldwide has forced design engineers to increase the solid concentrations when designing flumes. With this increase in concentration, the fluids become more non-Newtonian in behaviour. Very little data have been available to test some of the design protocols that have been proposed by various authors (Kozicki and Tiu, 1967;Wilson, 1991; De Kee et al., 1990). Limited amount of data have been published by some authors (Coussot, 1994; Naik, 1983) to test their own protocols. Haldenwang (2003) at the Flow Process Research Centre of the Cape Peninsula University of Technology created a large experimental database for non-Newtonian open channel flow. The experiments were carried out in three rectangular tilting flumes of different widths varying from 75 to 300 mm. The tests were conducted on three fluids: bentonite and kaolin suspensions and carboxymethylcellulose solutions, all at various concentrations. Rheological characterisation of the fluids were conducted in an inline tube viscometer with three different diameter tubes. This paper will describe the methodology behind how the data were obtained for the database. It is hoped that the database will be of use to researchers working in the area of non-Newtonian open channel flow.

Pipe flow of highly concentrated sludge

Industries that pump sludges experience pressure to operate at higher concentrations with sludges that have high mechanical strength properties. The viscous character of the sludge becomes increasingly non-Newtonian and yield stress in nature. The two principal problems are regime determination and laminar flow settling, which ultimately results in pipe blockage. In facing the diversities that sludge management currently presents, it is important to resolve these issues and develop solutions for engineering practice. The approaches developed at the Flow Process Research Centre to deal with these problems are introduced. The objectives of this paper are to introduce experimental data of the phenomena associated with the pipe flow of highly concentrated sludge, and use these to develop and evaluate predictive modeling approaches suitable for engineering design purposes. For the prediction of transitional flow, a new general approach for visco-plastic fluids in industrially relevant pipe sizes is presented, based on dimensional analysis of the flow problem. Settled bed behavior is modeled using an adapted two-layer model approach, in all flow regimes. The modeling approaches are evaluated using the experimental results obtained. The analysis shows that the present work provides a workable solution for the prediction of the pipe flow of highly concentrated sludges, for engineering design purposes.

The laminar/turbulent transition in a sludge pipeline

Globally, wastewater treatment plants are under pressure to handle high concentration sludge in a sludge treatment line. Unawareness of the non-Newtonian behaviour of the thickened sludge has the potential to cause unexpected problems when the fluid behaviour changes from turbulent to laminar flow. In this study, sludge apparent viscosity was plotted as a function of total suspended solids concentration (TSS) and shear rate. Then, the transition velocity based on several predictive models in the literature was determined. This analysis provides a practical basis for the prediction of the pipe flow behaviour of thickened sludge in troubleshooting and engineering design.

The Engineering Hydrodynamics of Viscoplastic Suspensions

From a practical engineering design and operation perspective, accurate hydrodynamic modeling of viscoplastic suspension behavior is fundamentally important. Since the hydrodynamics of process suspension flow behavior is strongly influenced by the suspension rheology, it is essential to accommodate the suspension rheology in any hydrodynamic modeling of the suspensions flow behavior. The objective of this article is to present the overarching modeling approach developed and to compare this with empirical suspension hydrodynamic behavior over wide ranges of fluid properties and applications. The relevant literature is reviewed, and the inability of dimensional analysis to accommodate the common yield stress rheological models applicable to industrial suspensions is discussed. This approach is evaluated in the context of hydrodynamics problems relevant to the process industry: straight pipe flow, energy losses in pipe fittings and valves, free surface flows, and centrifugal pump derating. Comparison with experimental data shows that this generic modeling approach leads to accurate establishment of dynamic similarity, which is a fundamental precursor to efficient engineering design for the process industry.

Predicting the apparent viscosity and yield stress of mixtures of primary, secondary and anaerobically digested sewage sludge: Simulating anaerobic digesters.

Predicting the flow behaviour, most notably, the apparent viscosity and yield stress of sludge mixtures inside the anaerobic digester is essential because it helps optimize the mixing system in digesters. This paper investigates the rheology of sludge mixtures as a function of digested sludge volume fraction. Sludge mixtures exhibited non-Newtonian, shear thinning, yield stress behaviour. The apparent viscosity and yield stress of sludge mixtures prepared at the same total solids concentration was influenced by the interactions within the digested sludge and increased with the volume fraction of digested sludge - highlighted using shear compliance and shear modulus of sludge mixtures. However, when a thickened primary - secondary sludge mixture was mixed with dilute digested sludge, the apparent viscosity and yield stress decreased with increasing the volume fraction of digested sludge. This was caused by the dilution effect leading to a reduction in the hydrodynamic and non-hydrodynamic interactions when dilute digested sludge was added. Correlations were developed to predict the apparent viscosity and yield stress of the mixtures as a function of the digested sludge volume fraction and total solids concentration of the mixtures. The parameters of correlations can be estimated using pH of sludge. The shear and complex modulus were also modelled and they followed an exponential relationship with increasing digested sludge volume fraction.

Effect of fly ash size fraction on the potential to neutralise acid mine drainage and rheological properties of sludge

AbstractLarge quantities of fly ash (FA) are generated annually in South Africa and most of it is disposed in landfills and ash dams. Previous studies indicated that FA can be used to treat acid mine drainage (AMD), another waste stream commonly found in the minerals industry. Moreover, encouraging results were obtained from the studies carried out on the sludge (referred as solid residues (SR) hereafter) recovered from FA-AMD treatment as a suitable mine backfill material. Particle size distribution (PSD) of FA plays an important role in the AMD treatment quality and viscosity of the SR that can be used directly for backfill purposes. In this study, we have investigated the effect of PSD of FA on AMD neutralisation and metal removal. This work also looked at the effect of PSD on the rheology of the SR. Neutralisation experiments indicated that the higher fines fraction enhances the treatment of AMD by reducing the time taken to increase the pH to a minimum of 7. Moreover, FA with higher fines fraction ha...