Progress 09/01/17 to 02/28/22
Outputs
Target Audience:Nutrient Recovery and Upcycling is has presented at multiple conferences for the wastewater treatment industry and has reached out to farmers and fertilizer manufacturers during this reporting period. - Wastewater Treatment Industry at all levels through the CalPrex® technology report in the Water Research Foundation website - Wastewater Treatment Industry at all levels by participation in WEFTECH 2021 in Chicago (Oct 16 - 20, 2021) - Customers of SteadyState Fertilizers via NRU's commercial website (www.newsteadystate.com) for direct to consumer sales - Fertilizer companies like Yara, ICL, OCP, Andersons Group, and others interested in the CalPrex® technology and the materials it recovers Changes/Problems:The main problem we had was the COVID-19 Pandemic that affected every aspect of our project from March 2020 to march 2022. We had to ask for no cost extensions and some aspects of the project were delayed due to closures at universities and other institutions. Also, there were significant problems derived from the understaffing USDA suffered as a result of the move from Washington DC to Kansas City MO limiting our access to personnel able to answer our questions and make decisions on various requests. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Team members attended several conferences in the wastewater industry to present on the CalPrex® technology and its potential benefits to the wastewater treatment industry; among them WEFTECH 2018, WEFTECH 2020, Central States Water Environment Association Virtual Conference, and others. Team members have also gained further skills and proficiency in fertilizer manufacturing, registration, packaging, marketing and direct to consumer commercialization. During 2021 NRU also hired one University of Wisconsin undergraduate student for a 12 month internship to work on various aspects of the business that ranged from granulation trials and granulation of commercial fertilizers to social media campaigns, contract of online advertisement, and other marketing strategies and exercises to promote NRU ?s registered brand, SteadyState® Fertilizers via our website www.newsteadystate.com. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?NRU team members presented on recovered brushite at the Soil Science Society of America and hosted a Central States Water Environment Association Promoted Tour of the CalPrex® pilot at the Greene Valley Wastewater Treatment Plant in Woodridge, DuPage County IL. Home and Garden fertilizer formulas were registered and marketed directly to consumers. Brand name registered: Steady State Fertilizers Website: www.newsteadystate.com from 2019 to present date. A 200-page final report for NRU-CNP 2018 CalPrex® Pilot developed at the Nine Springs Wastewater Treatment Plant in Madison Wisconsin was published through the Water Research Foundation (WRF) in collaboration with the City of Madison, WI, the City of Milwaukee, WI and the City of Boston, MA, plus the engineering firms Black and Veatch, and Hazen and Sawyer in April of 2021. The title of the report is: "Demonstrating the CalPrex System for High-Efficiency Phosphorus Recovery" and is currently available in the Water Research Foundation's website What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
1. Pilot-scale reclamation of phosphorus from Municipal Wastewater The value of extracting phosphorus from various kinds of wastewaters is predicated on phosphorus being an essential plant nutrient in agriculture while at the same time a serious contaminant in water ecosystems. The Pilot work performed by NRU at the Nine Springs Wastewater Treatment Plant in Madison, Wisconsin was finally published as a Technology Review by the Water Research Foundation in April of 2021. The title of the report is: "Demonstrating the CalPrex System for High-Efficiency Phosphorus Recovery", and it was co-sponsored by Metro Wastewater Reclamation District of Denver, the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District, and the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority. The report was written primarily by Menachem Tabanpour of Centrisys-CNP and NRU, plus significant contributions in the form of writing and reviews by Leon Downing from Black and Veatch Engineering, Wendell Khunjar of Hazen and Sawyer Engineering, and Phillip Barak of NRU. This report and a webcast can be found online at the WRF website. Highlights from this Pilot are: - The first phase of the pilot produced a total P capture rate of 42% and a soluble P capture rate of 66% relative to total and soluble phosphorus in the acid digest feed - Average total P removal by CalPrex® was 46.7 - 49.9% of total treatment plant P - Soluble P removal in the reactor was 90.6-93.1% - CalPrex® can perform high-rate phosphorus recovery prior to digestion for facilities that have, or are willing to implement, a thickened-sludge P-release tank or acid digester - CalPrex® precipitates brushite, a calcium phosphate mineral, at pH 6.5 with calcium hydroxide, which is a cost-effective input - Lab testing procedures and BioWin modeling are available for utilities, engineering firms, and researchers to study and model CalPrex© - CalPrex© does not need ammonium, making it a good technology solution for predigestion phosphorus recovery and post-aerobic digestion phosphorus recovery - Facilities implementing CalPrex with biological phosphorus removal (bio-P) sludge, as well as thickened primary and waste activated sludges, could recover up to 50% or more of their P from their sludge, reducing hauling costs of biosolids and mitigating struvite formation. - The recovered brushite is a demonstrated fertilizer material interchangeable with commonly available fertilizers 2. Pilot-scale testing for agglomeration and pelletizing of brushite During the Phase II pilot, the brushite was collected as a wet cake, then dried and ground. In a full-scale application, the brushite would be conveyed continuously through a dryer and granulated as part of the drying or fertilizer production process. In 2019,~200 lbs of granulated brushtie was sent to Professor Julie Howe, PhD, at Texas A&M University for field trials with corn, cotton, and winter wheat in soils likely to show response to P fertilization with conventional (triple superphosphate and monoammonium phosphate) and alternative (brushite and struvite) P fertilizers. Some brushite was also sent to Eirich Machines, Inc., for pelletizing tests. After the Eirich Machine trials, a wide variety of granulation, drying, and coating trials were also run at NRU facilities in Verona, Wisconsin, and used for formulation of commercial products for direct-to-consumer sales under the Steady State® brand. The results of these granulation trials were pushed from the experimental realm to the commercial realm by packaging three commercial formulas containing reclaimed brushite under the Steady State© fertilizer brand and sold to distributors and directly to consumers through the Steady State© website (www.newsteadystate.com). 3. Demonstrate value of brushite as a P fertilizer in field crop trials Granulated brushite was used to produce approximately 200 lbs of pelletized brushite to be tested in field experiments run by Dr. Julie Howe, Assistant Professor in the Department of Agronomy at Texas A&M University. These field experiments were performed to compare the efficiency of brushite as a P fertilizer for corn, cotton, and winter wheat at two Texas A&M University research stations (Lubbock and College Park). During the 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 growing seasons, Dr. Howe´s team at Texas A&M AgriLife Research conducted field trials at two locations in Texas to assess the fertilizer potential of NRU's reclaimed and upcycled brushite. Corn and wheat were evaluated at Snook, Central Texas, while cotton and wheat were evaluated in Lubbock, Southern High Plains of Texas.?The experimental design was a randomized complete block with 4 replications.?Treatments include four phosphorus sources (triple super phosphate, mono-ammonium phosphate, struvite, and reclaimed brushite from the Nine Springs WTP Pilot) applied at 3 rates (1/2, 1, and 2 times the recommended rate for the field site and crop) plus a control without P. Nitrogen was equalized among the treatments. The struvite used was also reclaimed from urban wastewaters using the AirPrex® technology developed by CNP Technologies Inc., NRU's partners in the commercial development for CalPrex©. The fields utilized for this trial were expected to exhibit a response to P and be spread among different soil types and ecosystems.? All tests are managed according to typical crop recommendation practices.? Soil samples were collected from each plot at the beginning and end of the field season and analyzed for nitrate, ammonium, and Mehlich-III extractable nutrients.?Leaf tissue samples are evaluated at mid-season and harvest for total P and total N. Plot yields are extrapolated to acre or hectare basis. Two locations (Snook and Lubbock, TX) were identified as sites where P response was likely to occur.?For the 2019 season, corn was grown in Snook and cotton in Lubbock.? Both sites grew wheat during the 2019-2020 winter. Main Results:? The main result of these two years of experiments was a lack of response to P at both sites, for all fertilizers and rates and for all the crops. Although minor differences are observed for some treatments (crop x year x rate) none were consistent across a given fertilizer for increasing rates. Also, variations in tissue P concentrations due to differences in growth stages also introduce a large variability that further limited the predictability of the trials. Overall, brushite showed very similar yields to those obtained with MAP and slightly higher (but not statistically different) than those of TSP. Also, yields did not show statistically significant differences as a function of increasing fertilizer rates either. A similar picture emerged with regards to corn leaf P concentrations where no clear pattern could be observed between fertilizer types or fertilizer rates. 4. Chemical Transformation Experiments The chemical transformation experiments were conducted under subcontract at the Barak Lab in the Department of Soil Science at UW-Madison. The experimental approach was to go from the simplest chemical transformations to the more complex. Treatments for production of triple superphosphate, single superphosphate, and nitrophosphate were executed with raw brushite and burnt or calcined brushite for a total of 14 transformation trials. From the results of these work, it was clear that in most cases the cost of the transformation could not be covered by gains in available P2O5 or higher N, S or P concentrations.In essence, the best business case for the use of reclaimedbrushite is to perform recovery, drying, formulation, granulation, disinfection, bagging, and labeling at the point of recovery without further consumption of reagents while minimizing risk, logistics and cost in the entire process.
Publications
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Barak, P.W., Tabanpour, M.E., Avila, M. From Brushite Modeling to Calprex(TM) Pilot--Phosphorus Recovery from Wastewater in the Real World. Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) International Soils Meeting. 6-9 January 2019. Oral presentation.
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2018
Citation:
Tabanpour, M.E., "CNP CalPrex" High Efficiency Phosphorus Recovery Tour." Central States Water Environment Association Promoted Tour. 30 October 2018. Tour and Oral Presentation.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Barak, P.W., Tabanpour, M.E., Avila, M. "From Brushite Modeling to Calprex (TM) Pilot-- Phosphorus Recovery from Wastewater in the Real World." Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) International Soils Meeting. 6-9 January 2019. Oral presentation.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Tabanpour, M.E., G. Forstner, Z. Li, M. Avila, P.W. Barak, H. Yoshida, L. Downing, W. Khunjar. "High Efficiency Calcium Phosphate Recovery Technology at the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District: Stability Metrics, Design Optimization, and Performance." WEFTEC. 21-25 September 2019. Oral presentation and conference paper.
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2021
Citation:
Tabanpour, M.E., L. Downing, K. Wendell. 2021. Demonstrating the CalPrex System for High-Efficiency Phosphorus Recovery. The Water Research Foundation; Metro Wastewater Reclamation District of Denver; and Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District. 162 p.
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Progress 09/01/19 to 08/31/20
Outputs
Target Audience:- Wastewater Treatment Industry at all levels through the Water Research Foundation website and CalPrex® technology report - Wastewater Treatment Industry at all levels by participation in WEFTECH 2021 in Chicago (Oct 16 - 20, 2021) - Customers of SteadyState Fertilizers via NRU's commercial website (www.newsteadystate.com) for direct to consumer sales Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?One team member attended a conference in the wastewater industry to present on the CalPrex® technology and its potential benefits to the wastewater treatment industry. Team members have also gained further skills and proficiency in fertilizer manufacturing, registration, packaging, marketing and direct to consumer commercialization. During 2021 NRU also hired one University of Wisconsin undergraduate student for a 12 month internship to work on various aspects of the business that ranged from granulation trials and granulation of commercial fertilizers to social media campaigns, contract of online advertisement, and other marketing strategies and exercises to promote NRU´s registered brand, SteadyState® Fertilizers. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?A 200-page final report for NRU-CNP 2018 CalPrex® Pilot developed at the Nine Springs Wastewater Treatment Plant in Madison Wisconsin was published through the Water Research Foundation (WRF) in collaboration with the City of Madison, WI, the City of Milwaukee, WI and the City of Boston, MA, plus the engineering firms Black and Veatch, and Hazen and Sawyer in April of 2021. The title of the report is: "Demonstrating the CalPrex System for High-Efficiency Phosphorus Recovery" and is currently available in the Water Research Foundation's website What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?This grant will be closed in May of 2022 and our final report will be issued within the appropriate timeline associated with the closing process.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
The objectives for this grant are listed as follows with the progress to date: (a) Create a pelletized brushite product that can be used in agriculture. During 2021 NRU continued to commercialize 3 brushite-based formulas that were registered in 25 US states during 2020. They are herb starter, garden bed starter and houseplant fertilizers that contain pelletized brushite. (b) Conduct field trials to compare brushite to commonly available phosphorus fertilizers. Dr. Julie Howe, Assistant Professor in the Department of Agronomy at Texas A&M University, concluded the field trials on four different crops starting Spring 2019 and Spring 2020 and provided a final report with the results of the trial. The fertilizers tested were Triple Super Phosphate, Mono-Ammonium Phosphate, Struvite and Brushite at rates of 62.5, 125 and 250 lb P2O5 per acre. In general, corn and wheat yields did not show predictable response to the varying rates of any of the fertilizers tested. Overall, fertilization with any of the fertilizers did not consistently raise yields or leaf P concentrations in the corn or wheat crops, likely indicating that P was not deficient in the soils or that other growth-limiting factors were more important than P. (c) Scale up successful bench-top trails that transformed brushite into other valuable products for agriculture and industry. Based on a reagents and products calculator developed in 2019, we evaluated transformation reactions of brushite with various acids in order to produce a variety of fertilizer formulations: Calcined or Raw brushite ore + sulfuric acid for production of Single Super Phosphate (SSP) Calcined or Raw brushite ore + phosphoric acid for production of Triple Super Phosphate (TSP) Calcined or Raw brushite ore + nitric acid for production of Nitro Phosphate A total of 18 materials (raw brushite, calcined brushite and 16 acid reactions) were evaluated from a chemical standpoint with Total P, Total S and citrate -soluble P as the main parameters. Most of the reactions gave products that were too acidic for direct use in fertilization programs, which is a result of incomplete reaction of the acids with the brushite and indicate that little is gained from reacting brushite with nitric, sulfuric, and phosphoric acid. The gains in P solubility obtained by means of acids did not compensate for the extra cost of the treatment. Overall, the only treatment that may be of value is the calcination of the brushite in order to increase its total P content from 14.1% P (32.3% P2O5) to 22.4% P (51.2% P2O5) and even then, the reduced cost of transportation hardly justifies the energy expenditure of the calcination process, depending on the relation between cost of energy and value of P in the market at a particular point in time.
Publications
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2021
Citation:
Tabanpour, M.E., L. Downing, K. Wendell. 2021. Demonstrating the CalPrex System for High-Efficiency Phosphorus Recovery. The Water Research Foundation; Metro Wastewater Reclamation District of Denver; and Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District. 162 p.
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