Paper Resume

Downflow Hanging Sponge (DHS) Reactor for treating domestic wastewater.

Prepared by Awaluddin Nurmiyanto.

1. Introduction

High rate anaerobic treatment processes, like upflow anaerobic sludge blanket
(UASB) reactor have been intensively used for the treatment domestic wastewater
because of their low operation costs, smaller space requirements, high organic
removal efficiency, low sludge production, and net energy benefit through the
production of biogas (Metcalf and Eddy, 2003).

However, the inability of UASB process to meet international disposal standards,

owing to its anaerobic nature has given enough impetus for the subsequent post
treatment. Furthermore, the growing concern over the impact of sewage
contamination on rivers and lakes and the increasing scarcity of water in the world
along with rapid population increase in urban areas give reasons to consider
appropriate technologies for the post treatment of anaerobic effluent in order to
achieve the desired effluent quality and save receiving water bodies.

A variety of post treatment configurations based on various combinations with UASB

have been studied such as aerobic suspended growth (stabilization pond,activated
sludge), aerobic attached growth (aerobic biofilter, DHS), natural treatment
processes (constructed wetland), physical processes (Dissolved air flotation) and
chemical processes (adsorption, zeolite ion exchange) (Chernicalo, 2006; A.K.
Mungray et. al., 2010; Khan et. al., 2011).

Among those available technologies, it is strongly recommended to use DHS system

for post-treatment of anaerobic pre-treated sewage. It also reported if combined
UASB-DHS can achieve high BOD removal ratio (>90%). It is also found efficient for
the removal of E. coli and nitrogen (Tawfik et al., 2006). Moreover work by M.
Tandukar et al (2007) showed DHS effluent water is similar to an activated sludge
process and satisfies adequate levels for discharge with higher nitrification efficiency.
The present paper resumed several work on DHS reactor used for the treatment of
anaerobic effluents especially for UASB based domestic wastewater (sewage)
treatment plants.

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2. Downflow Hanging Sponge (DHS) Reactor Process

Downflow hanging sponge (DHS) was developed by Professor Hideki Harada and his
research groups at Nagaoka University of technology (now he move to Tohoku
University) Japan. It was developed for the aerobic post treatment of the UASB
reactor effluent and reached the level adequate to satisfy discharge standards. DHS
is an aerobic treatment similar to trickling filter. The principle of DHS system (Figure
1) is the use of polyurethane foam (sponge) as the growing and supporting medium
for microorganisms. The UASB reactor effluent is discharged to the upper side of the
DHS media and it flowed (trickled) downstream by gravitational forces. BOD in the
water is effectively oxidized in the downstream by the function of polyurethane
sponge that can retain water and microorganisms (attached growth).

Wastewater  

Hanging  Sponge  in  The  

Air  

External  Aeration  
AIR   AIR  

AIR   AIR  
Clean  polyurethane   Sponge  with  
sponge   biomass  

Treated  effluent  
 

Figure 1 Concept of DHS (adapted from Uemura and Harada, 2010)

Inside the reactor, high porosity of sponge material providing longer mean cell
residence time and at the same time enhancing the diffusion of air into the
wastewater. This phenomenon maintains Dissolved Oxygen (DO) concentration in
the wastewater at a level which exceeds the need of aerobes residing in DHS sludge,
curtailing the need of any external forced aeration unlike most of the existing aerobic
treatment systems. Sponge has a void ratio more than 90%, which provides an
excellent site for the growth and attachment of active biomass. The DHS system has
been successfully used for organic matter stabilization and nutrient control since both
nitrification and denitrification takes place in DHS system (M. Tandukar et al., 2005)

2
DHS system have attracted considerable interest as an alternative to the
conventional suspended growth and attached growth wastewater treatment
processes due to its high performance efficiency (M.M. Tandukar et al., 2007;
Mahmoud et al., 2010). DHS reactors offer several advantages such as higher
biomass concentration, higher Sludge Residence Time (SRT), lower Hydraulic
Retention Time (HRT), and small footprint as compared to conventional treatment
systems (Mahmoud et al., 2010). Sponge has been considered as an ideal attached
growth media because it can act as a mobile carrier for active biomass. Sponge not
only can reduce membrane fouling by means of mechanical cleaning and maintain a
balance of suspended-attached microorganisms in Submerged Membrane Bioreactor
(SMBR), but also can enhance dissolved organic matter and nutrient removal. The
high porosity of sponge helps in the entrapment of microorganisms and organic
matter thus providing a longer SRT (M. Tandukar et al., 2005).

2.1. Historical Development of DHS

Since the emergence of the first DHS prototype over fifteen year ago, it has been
modified to newer configurations, making it simple, more cost effective and suitable
for real scale application (Figure 2). Cube type DHS, known as the first generation
DHS (DHS G1), it was like a rosary of cube shaped sponges (1.5 cm each side) that
hung freely in the air with the help of a nylon string (Agrawal et al., 1997; Machdar et
al., 1997). The system exhibited good efficiency in removing organics and
nitrogenous compounds, when applied as a post treatment unit for UASB treating
sewage. However, the configuration was not compatible for real-scale application. To
overcome this drawback, the modification was carried out. Better arrangement of
sponges was constructed with long triangular polyurethane sponge strips (3 cm×3
cm×75 cm) tiled on both side of a plastic sheet (Machdar et al., 2000). This new type
of DHS was called curtain type DHS or the second generation DHS (DHS G2). DHS
G2 is a big leap on DHS technology since it has been constructed at a pilot scale
with capacity 1000 m3/day for post treatment of sewage water in Karnal India. The
performance of the plant has been quite good with the effluent BOD around 10 mg/l
and SS 10 mg/l (M. Tandukar et al., 2006).

Other designs of DHS were conceptualized bringing forth the third generation (DHS
G3) and the fourth generation (DHS G4) DHS reactors. The third generation DHS
was more like a tricking filter, packing medium being replaced by small sponge units
put inside a net-like plastic (PVC) cover as supporting media. The DHS G3

3
construction was simple as sponge units were randomly packed inside a reactor
container. When wastewater flows down the DHS reactor, it permeates one sponge
strip, comes out of it and enters the next sponge strip (Hariom et al., 2012). While
DHS G4 is the improvement of the previous type (DHS G3), it has box modules with
long sponge strips (2.5 cm×2.5cm×50 cm) that placed inside a net cylindrical plastic
cover to provide rigidity (M. Tandukar et al., 2006). The DHS G4 design used to
enhancing dissolution of air into the wastewater and in avoiding possible clogging of
the reactor due to sudden washout from UASB.

Figure 2 Evolution of DHS (Source: Presentation slide by Prof.Harada, 2008)

Newer concept of DHS reactor (DHS G5) was developed in 2004, the reactor had
modules constructed by lining up twelve sheets of such curtain type DHS G2. The
entire curtains were placed side by side inside a rectangular frame with a gap of 4 cm
between consecutive sheets. The sheets were fixed inside the frame with the help of
a hanger assembly. This whole construction was considered as a single module (M.
Tandukar et al., 2007). Yet the newest type of DHS reactor named sixth generation
(DHS G6) was constructed little different with the previous generation (DHS G1-DHS
G5). Instead of using a soft polyurethane sponge medium, DHS G6 was constructed
from a rigid sponge by copolymerizing polyurethane with epoxy resin. The DHS G6
reactor design it self was like previous DHS G3 type which the sponge media were
randomly packed but without any rigid plastic enclosure ring for supporting material.
As of more sponge surface area is exposed to wastewater and enhancing the
interactions between the wastewater, air, and biomass in the sponge (Onodera et al.,
2013).

4
3. Resume Previous Study on DHS Reactor
3.1. Harada Research Group

As described in the previous sub section (section 2.1), several works in DHS
development were conducted under supervision of professor Harada in Nagaoka
institute of technology, Japan. Their consecutive work on DHS briefly described as
follow:

1. The first research in DHS reactor (DHS G1) is Machdar et al (1997) with the
aim of the study was to investigate the feasibility of the proposed system.
Over six months experiment by feeding sewage their proposed system
achieved 94% of CODt removal, 81% of CODs removal and nearly perfect SS
and total BOD removal at overall HRT 8.3 h (7 h in UASB and 1.3 h in DHS).
The reactor was capable of performing high (73-78% of NH3-N removal)
nitrification. That found to be the system was capable of organic removal also
nitrification.
2. A work by Machdar et al (2000) is the second generation of DHS (DHS G2)
reactor proposed for sewage treatment system. The system consists of a
UASB reactor as an anaerobic pre-treatment unit and curtain-type DHS. They
described a long term (550 day) experiment to assess the process
performance of the whole combined system receiving actual sewage, with am
emphasis on nitrification behavior of DHS post treatment unit. The combined
system successfully achieved of unfiltered-BOD removal, 81–84% of
unfiltered-COD removal, and 63–79% of SS removal, at an overall HRT of 8 h
(6 h for UASB and 2 h for DHS units). Moreover, M. Tandukar et al. (2006)
evaluated for 3.5 years of the system regarding the applicability of curtain
type DHS process (DHS G2) to further treat the effluent of UASB treating
domestic sewage. Behavior of DHS system in response to hydraulic and
organic shock loads was also investigated. The observation suggested that
DHS has a capability to cope with higher organic shock loads, with rapid
recovery. However, the performance of the reactor especially in terms of
nitrogen removal deteriorated during the organic shock load.
3. The DHS G3 system (random type) investigated by Tawfik et al (2006) for 6
months at an 15°C average waste temperature. The results showed that a
combined system operated at a total HRT of 10.7 h and total SRT of 88 days
represents a cost effective sewage treatment process. The average total
COD and total BOD5 concentrations measured in the final effluent of the total

5
 system (UASB+DHS) amounted to 43 and 3.0 mg/L, respectively,
corresponding to the overall removal efficiency of 90% for total COD and 98%
for total BOD5. The total process provided a final effluent containing a low
concentration of 12 mg/L for TSS. 86% of ammonia was eliminated at space
loading rate of 1.6 kg COD/m3-d and HRT of 2.7 h. The removal of F.coliform
in the UASB reactor only amounted to 0.86 log10. On the other hand, the F.
coliform concentration dropped substantially, i.e. by 2.6 log10 in the DHS
system resulting only 2.7x103 in the final effluent. The calculated average
sludge production was indeed very low only 6.0 g TSS/d corresponding to
sludge yield coefficient of 0.09 g TSS/g total COD removed, for DHS system.
4. The forth generation (DHS G4) was developed to overcome a few
shortcomings of its predecessors (M. Tandukar et al., 2005). The whole
system was operated at a total HRT of 8 h (UASB 6 h + DHS 2 h) for a period
of over 600 days. The combined system was able to remove 96% of unfiltered
BOD. Likewise, F.coli were removed by 3.45 log with the final count of 103 to
104 MPN/100ml. Nutrient removal by the system was also satisfactory
achieved. Other sequence development of DHS was reported by M. Tandukar
et al (2007). The DHS system (DHS G5) was continuously operated and
evaluated for more than 300 days to compare the performance to that
activated sludge process (ASP) for the treatment of municipal sewage. The
study revealed that organic removal efficiency of combined UASB-DHS
system was comparable to that of ASP (BOD removal > 90%) but has 15
times lower excess sludge generated.
5. Latest study on DHS reactor was performed by Onedera et al (2013).
Combined UASB and DHS system were operated at 10-28°C with a hydraulic
retention time (HRT) of 10.6 h (8.6 h for UASB and 2 h for DHS). The DHS
G6 was attributed to the new rigid sponge media that helped to provide a
sufficient HRT, and retained a high biomass concentration, extending the
solids retention time. The result on DHS G6 showed good organic and
nitrogen removal efficiencies. The final effluent had a total biochemical
oxygen demand of only 12 mg/L and a total Kjeldahl nitrogen content of 6
mg/L. Comparatively the rigid sponge media retained less biomass than by
any soft sponge media used in previous studies, but higher removal activities
and lower amounts of excess sludge were found in this study than in studies
using soft sponges.

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3.2. Other research groups work on DHS reactor

DHS success story in sewage treatment encourage several research group to study
further. Other research group who interest in DHS reactor found in: India, Egypt and,
Thailand. Some of the research work briefly described as follow:

1. A. Fleifle et al (2013) assessed removal mechanism of COD, TSS, and

ammonia in a down-flow hanging sponge (DHS) system treating agricultural
drainage water (ADW). The system used is DHS G3, it consists of three
segments (S1, S2, and S3) connected vertically in series and operated at
total HRT of 2 h and OLR of 3 kg COD/m3 d. The results of this study showed
that the major portions of CODtot and TSS were removed in S1 and S2, while
the ammonia oxidation occurred in the lower segment (S3). This was mainly
because the food/microorganism (F/M) ratio was higher in S1 and S2,
favoring the heterotrophic biomass, while nitrifying bacteria were dominant in
S3. The simulation model found if the system deals well with fluctuations in
hydraulic and organic loads of ADW without affecting efficiency. Again,
Egyptian researcher (Saad El-Tabl et al., 2013) found that DHS can be
compared as high as conventional activated sludge proses in treating sewage
water. This research also found if smaller sponge media sizes in the DHS
reactors give better removal efficiencies for all the parameters above
2. Possibility the use of DHS on Anoxic ammonium oxidation (anammox)
process has been conducted by H.P. Chuang et al (2008). The closed DHS
reactor was constructed and fed with artificial wastewater, then operated for
ten month continuously. The results show nitrogen removal rate at 1.85 kg
N/m3 sponge per day with 95% of removal efficiency. Microbial analysis in the
sponge media showed that annamox bacteria “Candidatus Kuenenia
stugartiensis” dominated. It was concluded that DHS technology in
combination with anammox process benefited in developing a low-cost
nitrogen-removal system. Furthermore Matsuura et al. (2010) investigated
two stage of closed DHS reactor and measure methane gas released from
DHS system. The result showed most of the dissolved methane (99%) was
recovered by the two-stage system, whereas about 76.8% of influent
dissolved methane was recovered by the first stage operated at 2h HRT. The
second DHS reactor was mainly used for oxidation of the residual methane
and polishing of the remaining organic carbons.

7
So far most of the research work on the DHS system has been with sewage
wastewater treatment (section 3.1). As far on my knowledge, limited work has been
reported on other type of wastewater treatment using DHS, some of them briefly
explained below:

1. A work by Nakamura et al (2006) applied DHS reactor to treat synthetic dye

wastewater. The system performance was investigated for about 500 days
operated in 12 different modes with a HRT of 8 hour for each reactor. The
result showed if actual dye wastewater that originally contained 1000 mg/L
COD, 700 mg/L BOD, was effectively treated using the system combining
anaerobic/aerobic UASB and DHS reactors, achieving approximately 80%
COD removal, and more than 95% BOD removal.
2. Highly saline artificial coke-plant wastewater containing 1400 mg/L of phenol
in terms of chemical oxygen demand (COD) and 500 mg-N/L of ammonium
nitrogen was fed into combined UASB-DHS system. The COD was removed
achieving 92% removal at an average COD loading rate of 3.0 kg-COD/m3d.
Microbial assays of the different units of the reactor revealed greater numbers
of nitrifying bacteria. These findings suggest that combined DHS can be
applied to industrial wastewater (S.Uemura et al., 2010)
3. Wichitsathian and Racho (2010) try to treat tapioca starch wastewater using
random type (DHS G3) DHS reactor. They highlighted the results of COD and
nitrogen mass balances indicated that there was a possibility of eliminating
COD in BDHS system due to aerobic heterotroph consumption and
denitrification processes. Moreover Nasr et al (2012) investigate the H2
production and efficiency of up-flow anaerobic staged reactor (UASR)
combined with DHS to treat starch industrial wastewater. DHS was operated
at an HRT of 1.5 h and OLR of 10 gCOD/l.d. Combined DHS with UASR as a
pretreatment achieved an overall removal efficiency of 83%.
4. Another combined treatment system (UASB+DHS) was operated by feeding
raw onion dehydration wastewater taken from vegetable factory in Egypt. The
combined system was operated at two different overall HRT (11 h and 9.4 h).
Based on the available results, The performance of the proposed system was
excellent, achieving an average removals of TCOD, SCOD, TBOD, TSS, TKN
and ammonia (H. El-Kamah et al., 2011).

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4. Factor Affecting Performance of DHS Reactor

The DHS system was more like a trickling, packing medium being replaced by small
sponge units put inside a net-like plastic cover. In contrast, DHS emerge to overcome
some problem happened in trickling filter (TF). Inside the TF micro-organisms attach
themselves only to a media surface creating a biological filter or slime layer, but in
DHS system the micro organisms retained outside and inside the sponge which
create a long sludge residence time (>100 days) (Tawfik et al., 2006) and
consequently, achieve a complete nitrification and produce a very low amount of
excess sludge. The process is in contrast to conventional TF, it needs a very low
loading rate to achieve a nitrification process. Some factor affecting performance on
DHS reactors briefly described as follow:

4.1. Hydraulic Retention Time (HRT)

Hydraulic retention time (HRT) expressed as hour is the time taken by the
wastewater to flow through the DHS reactor. It is very essential for the wastewater to
remain in the reactor and be in contact with the microbe attached on the media
(sponge). HRT depends on the flow rate of wastewater to the DHS reactor and the
volume and porosity of the sponge media. Maximum HRT can result from a slower
rate of wastewater discharge into the sponge media. Increase the HRT can also
obtained by increasing the volume of sponge media.

The longer wastewater remains in the reactor in contact with the microbes (longer
HRT), the greater will be the efficiency of organic removal. This theory was confirmed
by those obtained by Mahmoud et al (2010) evaluated performance of DHS in
treating pre settled municipal wastewater with different HRT (6, 4, and 2h). The
results showed that increasing the HRT from 2 to 6h significantly improved the
removal of COD fractions. The removal efficiencies of COD were 89, 80, and 56% for
CODtot and 82, 79, and 42% for CODsol at HRTs of 6, 4, and 2 h, respectively. Equal
result for other parameter such as Ammonia and total phosphorous.

4.2. Hydraulic Loading Rate (HLR)

In simpler terms hydraulic loading rate (HLR) can be defined as the volume of
wastewater applied per unit area of sponge media per unit time (m3/m.d). high HLR
leads to reduce HRT in the DHS reactor and could reduce the treatment efficiency.
The relationship between removal rate and the HLR has been investigated by
Mahmoud et al (2010), that is COD removal was greatly influenced by the increase in

9
organic loading rate and hydraulic loading rate (HLR). A plot of removed CODtot
versus the organic and hydraulic loading rates for the DHS system is shown in Figure
3.

Figure 3 (a) CODtot removal versus HLR; (b) CODtot removal versus OLR. (source: Mahmoud et al,
2010)

Even the COD removal efficiency decreased, but long term performance of DHS
system was almost unaffected by the imposed hydraulic shock load ss reported by
M. Tandukar et al (2006). The removal of filtered COD remained virtually similar with
23–30 mg/L as residual value in the final effluent compared to 22–29 mg/L during the
normal conditions. However, nitrification process deteriorated during the period of
hydraulic shock load. Ammonium nitrogen removal efficiency reduced from 73%
(normal condition) to 38.3%.

4.3. Organic Loading Rate (OLR)

In the DHS system, the COD removal was greatly influenced by the increase in
organic loading rate (OLR) and hydraulic loading rate (HLR). Mahmoud et al (2010)
investigated different influent loading in DHS reactor, the applied OLR varied from
1.2 to 3.4 kg COD/m3d. With these carbonaceous loads, the DHS system showed the
reduction in CODtot removal efficiencies from 89 to 55% (Figure 3). Long term
evaluation of organic loading (shock load) in DHS by M. Tandukar et al (2006)
verified that increasement of OLR did not much impacting COD removal efficiency.
Nevertheless, the performance of the reactor, especially in terms of nitrogen removal,
deteriorated during the organic shock load. In higher organic loading an intense
separation of the attached biomass occurred contributing to high effluent COD
values, and the low removal efficiency was due to biosolid escape at this high
loading.

4.4. Sponge size

Polyurethane sponge as media to retain biomass is very indispensable in attached

10
growth biological system. The effect of sponge size on the performance of DHS
reactor was investigated by Uemura. Sh et al (2012).

Figure 4 Sponge size used in DHS reactor (Source:Uemura Sh et al, 2012)

Three identical DHS reactors with different sponge size (figure 4) were operated for
more than 130 day to treat settled sewage. The result showed all SS and COD
concentration in three reactors were less than 10 mg/L. But reactor 1 with the
smallest sponge media performed best in COD removal, followed by the No. 2 and
No. 3 reactors. Thus similar to the performance in ammonium nitrogen and F. coli
removal. In brief, the smaller sponge media sizes of the DHS reactor are better. The
author assumed that smaller sponge media allows better oxygen uptake in the
stream flowing down through the reactors. It confirmed by DO concentrations in the
reactors, highest DO concentration found in reactor No. 1 and lowest DO
concentration in reactor No. 3. Moreover smaller sponge media give higher surface
area, thus contact between the sludge and the wastewater is better and could
possibility enhance the organic removal.

4.5. Media depth

Mahmoud et al (2011) conducted analysis of DO concentration along the DHS

reactor. They found that a gradual increase of DO as the wastewater flows
downwards, as also found by M. Tandukar et al (2006). Available data indicates a
steady increase in DO concentration from zero in the DHS reactor influent into 7.2mg
O2/l in the final effluent (1st treatment scheme). Corresponding value in the 2nd
treatment scheme was 6.5mg O2/l. This could be due to the increase in DO transfer
to the wastewater as a result of increasing the wastewater flow rate and velocity at
the lower HRT. These results are In agreement with the greatest removal rate of
soluble COD occurred at the 1st half of the DHS reactor then decreased
exponentially as the wastewater moved downward the reactor and the soluble COD

11
fraction became a limiting factor (Figure 5).

Figure 5 Distribution pattern of COD along DHS reactor (Source:M. Mahmoud h et al, 2011)

4.6. Ventilation

The one and only oxygen source in DHS reactor was through the ventilation system.
Natural draft ventilation operates very effectively as long as the temperature and
humidity differences between the air inside and outside the trickling filter are
sufficiently large to generate the needed force. The effects of ventilation and the
oxygen concentration inside the DHS G6 reactor were evaluated by Onedera et al
(2013). The reactor ventilation was controlled by opening or closing the windows in
the three connecting segments as follow: Phase 1, all closed; Phase 2, all opened;
Phase 3, first window opened. The result showed, there were no substantial
differences between the DHS influents characteristics in Phases 1, 2, or 3.The TKN
concentrations in the DHS effluent during Phases 1, 2, and 3 were 3.8 1, 21.5±7,
and 14.0±4 mg/L, respectively, which corresponded to removal efficiencies of 87.2%,
32.9%, and 68.6%, respectively. These tests clearly showed that good ventilation of
the DHS reactor is essential for enhancing its performance.

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