Today energy and clean water is a requirement in all societies worldwide to run productive processes. This affects the natural environment negatively and requires establishing more environmentally sustainable processes to decrease dependency and preserve the natural environment. In this research approach a laboratory anaerobic aerobic effluent treatment system was designed, built, and started up with wastewater. After start-up the system was operated with prepared milk waste, liquid cow manure and wastewater at a hydraulic retention time of 3 days and 6 days. The laboratory anaerobic aerobic system was able to degrade the chemical oxygen demand, total solids and total suspended solids of all three influent liquids up to 95% and 98% for the 3-day and 6-day hydraulic retention time. Maximum total solids removal was 87.89% and 92.43% for the 3-day and 6-day hydraulic retention time. Total suspended solids removal yielded a maximum of 99.87 and 99.93% for the 3-day and 6-day hydraulic retention time. The anaerobic sludge blanket reactor of the system operated at a temperature of 38°C and a pH between 7.5 and 8.2 achieved a biogas CH4 content of 65% ± 5% and a maximum total biogas production of 2.23 ml/h for the milk waste at a 3-day hydraulic retention time and a minimum biogas production of 1.36 ml/h for the waste water the 3-day and 6-day HRT respectively. The operation of the designed laboratory anaerobic aerobic effluent treatment system showed that it is capable of reducing the effluent loading of a variety of waste streams as well as producing biogas that can be converted into bio-energy.

Energy is required in all societies worldwide. This led to a dependency of fossil fuel. During uncertain times fossil fuel supply become highly politically and used as an influencing source. This requires establishing a more environmentally friendly processes to decrease dependency. To produce biogas from municipal, agricultural and industrial waste a laboratory benchtop up-flow sludge blanket reactor with a operating volume of 2850 ml was designed build, started up, and operated using prepared municipal wastewater and separated liquid cow manure at a hydraulic retention time of 1 day, 3 days and 6 days after an 120 h adjustment time prior to testing. While using wastewater as influent, the laboratory benchtop up-flow sludge blanket reactor system was not able to reduce the chemical oxygen demand content significantly. Especially at a high volumetric flow rate for the 1-day hydraulic retention time. The produced gas amount decreased from 0.59 ±0.07 (ml/h)/L at a hydraulic retention rate of 6 days to 0.042 ±0.04 (ml/h)/L. The fluctuating influent chemical oxygen demand of 25 ±1 mg/L to 74 ±15 mg/L resulted in a stable effluent concentration of 39 ml/L and 45 ±11 mg/L respectively. The laboratory benchtop up-flow sludge blanket reactor system with separated liquid cow manure showed a higher chemical oxygen demand degradation capability but resulted in higher chemical oxygen demand in the effluent. The influent chemical oxygen demand of 308 ±42 mg/L was broken downs to 59 ±1 mg/L at a hydraulic retention time of 6 days and to 114 ±5 mg/L for 1 day retention time. The biogas production result in a stable gas production rate of 0.27 ±0.02 (ml/h)/L through all three hydraulic retention times. For both the wastewater and separated liquid cow manure operation the biogas without carbon dioxide was between 55 and 65%. The results show that the laboratory benchtop up-flow sludge blanket reactor system can reduce high chemical oxygen demand in wastewater and separated liquid cow manure. However, a minimum feed level having a minimal chemical oxygen demand above 36 mg/L is needed, otherwise, the active bacterial mass contributes to the effluent level as seen for the influent level below 36 mg/L and 25 mg/L which resulted in a minimum effluent level of 39 mg/L for a hydraulic retention time of 3-days and 6-days.

One in every five households in the United States of America operates a decentralized water treatment systems which is also know as septic system, which may contribute to pollutions in water bodies if not operated properly. For this research a 15.0-liter (3.97 gal.) laboratory benchtop septic system was designed, build, installed and operated at a temperature of 23.0°C (73.4°F) to investigate the remediation of municipal wastewater. A three-week start-up phase was used prior to operating the system with unfiltered wastewater collected from primary clarifier at a wastewater treatment. The operational test phase included an hydraulic retention rate of 5, 10 and 20 days which corresponds to 3000 ml/d, 1500 ml/d, and 750 ml/d respectively. Based on the above results, the laboratory benchtop septic system minimum effluent values for the chemical oxygen demand are 18±1 mg/l, and 60±10 mg/l for the total solids content, and <5±1 mg/l for the total suspended solids. These values correspond to the published effluent concentration range of 30% to 80% of influent concentrations for septic tanks. The results show, that the laboratory benchtop septic systems is able to reduce the chemical oxygen demand, total solids content, and total suspended solids content level of municipal wastewater and can be a valuable tool to access the performance of septic systems utilizing different wastewater influent types.

A laboratory biotower septic tank system was designed, installed, started up with unfiltered wastewater during a 9-day start-up phase, and operated at a hydraulic retention time of 5-, 15-, and 20 days with filtered waste water and 5-, 10-, and 15 days for liquid cow manure. The system was operated at a laboratory room temperature of 23.0±0.5°C (73.4 ± 0.9°F). The system had an influent pH of 7.5 ±0.1 and a slightly higher pH of 8.0±0.1 for the effluent for filtered wastewater, and an influent pH of 7.3 ±0.1 and a slightly increased effluent pH of 7.5 ± 0.1 for the operation with liquid cow manure. This research showed that the system is able to achieve an effluent chemical oxygen demand level between 17 ±1 mg/l, and 19 ±1 mg/l for a hydraulic retention time between 5-, and 20 days for filtered waste water, and between 23 ±1 mg/l and 32 ±3 mg/l for a hydraulic retention time between 5-, and 15 days for liquid cow manure at highly varying influent chemical oxygen demand levels between 25 ±1 mg/l and 74 ±15 mg/l and 293 ±46 mg/l to 335 ±14 mg/ for filtered wastewater and liquid cow manure respectively. The Total solids content in the effluent of the system showed an increase for the filtered wastewater and liquid cow manure influent with increasing hydraulic retention rate from of 55 mg/l to 71 mg/l and from 25 mg/l to 53 mg/l respectively. Total suspended solids for both, the filtered wastewater and the liquid cow manure was below the 4mg/l mark, except for the liquid cow manure 5-day hydraulic retention rate which had a value of 20 mg/l.