How will we know if any of our design changes have resulted in any improvements? We need to have a control at minimum and we need a design that will enable us to collect meaningful data about the parameters that we are trying to improve. I wonder if this means that we need to have at minimum 2 and perhaps more UASB systems operating in parallel. We also need to have a method of measuring or observing what is happening with flow distribution in the settled bed. I am concerned that if we simply build one large unit with no ability to see what is happening inside the reactor that we will not be able to demonstrate that we are making any advances.
The variables we want to test are:
flow pulsing
inlet design (diameter, spacing, and bottom geometry)
tube settler flow control
tube settle capture velocity
others?
We can't test all of these at once, so we need a set of reactors that can easily be modified to enable these tests. I see the first two items as highest priority.
With the goal of conducting research at the Ithaca Wastewater treatment facility (and not just running a pilot) we need to design the reactors to be easy enough to fabricate that we can build several of them this summer. We need a method that will enable us to observe what the settled bed does during flow pulses. Would it be useful to make the UASB out of clear plastic? We need a method to measure gas production in real time and preferable include online monitoring so that we can track performance of the plants from Cornell.
Realizing the importance of having a control and thus needing to build a bare minimum of 2 and ideally 3 or more reactors leads me to suspect that we would be well served to reduce the size of the pilot scale reactors.
How will we know if any of our design changes have resulted in any improvements? We need to have a control at minimum and we need a design that will enable us to collect meaningful data about the parameters that we are trying to improve. I wonder if this means that we need to have at minimum 2 and perhaps more UASB systems operating in parallel. We also need to have a method of measuring or observing what is happening with flow distribution in the settled bed. I am concerned that if we simply build one large unit with no ability to see what is happening inside the reactor that we will not be able to demonstrate that we are making any advances.
The variables we want to test are:
We can't test all of these at once, so we need a set of reactors that can easily be modified to enable these tests. I see the first two items as highest priority.
With the goal of conducting research at the Ithaca Wastewater treatment facility (and not just running a pilot) we need to design the reactors to be easy enough to fabricate that we can build several of them this summer. We need a method that will enable us to observe what the settled bed does during flow pulses. Would it be useful to make the UASB out of clear plastic? We need a method to measure gas production in real time and preferable include online monitoring so that we can track performance of the plants from Cornell.
Realizing the importance of having a control and thus needing to build a bare minimum of 2 and ideally 3 or more reactors leads me to suspect that we would be well served to reduce the size of the pilot scale reactors.