Nitrogen Removal in Woodchip‐based Biofilters of Variable Designs Treating Agricultural Drainage Discharges

Hoffmann, Carl Christian; Larsen, Søren E.; Kjærgaard, Charlotte

doi:10.2134/jeq2018.12.0442

Cited by 18 publications

(19 citation statements)

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“…Absolute removal was reported relative to mitigation measures surface area in our review, however, another possibility would be to report absolute removal per catchment area, however, the estimate of catchment areas are often very uncertain, adding more uncertainty to the removal estimate. The HLR also influence relative removal, where the removal efficiency tends to increase with decreasing HLR (Vymazal 2017 ; Hoffmann et al 2019 ) (Fig. S2 ), though temperature is at least as important.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Denitrification requires anoxic conditions, electron donors and availability of organic carbon. If these requirements are met, the rate of the denitrification is mainly controlled by temperature and the hydraulic retention time (HRT), which is inversely proportional to the water flow rate (Kadlec and Knight 1996 ; Hoffmann et al 2019 ). The water flow from subsurface drainage systems is driven by precipitation and snowmelt and, thus, varies greatly on a temporal as well as a spatial scale (Skaggs and van Schilfgaarde 1999 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Efficiency of mitigation measures targeting nutrient losses from agricultural drainage systems: A review

Carstensen

Hashemi

Hoffmann

et al. 2020

Ambio

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Diffusive losses of nitrogen and phosphorus from agricultural areas have detrimental effects on freshwater and marine ecosystems. Mitigation measures treating drainage water before it enters streams hold a high potential for reducing nitrogen and phosphorus losses from agricultural areas. To achieve a better understanding of the opportunities and challenges characterising current and new drainage mitigation measures in oceanic and continental climates, we reviewed the nitrate and total phosphorus removal efficiency of: (i) free water surface constructed wetlands, (ii) denitrifying bioreactors, (iii) controlled drainage, (iv) saturated buffer zones and (v) integrated buffer zones. Our data analysis showed that the load of nitrate was substantially reduced by all five drainage mitigation measures, while they mainly acted as sinks of total phosphorus, but occasionally, also as sources. The various factors influencing performance, such as design, runoff characteristics and hydrology, differed in the studies, resulting in large variation in the reported removal efficiencies.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Efficiency of mitigation measures targeting nutrient losses from agricultural drainage systems: A review

Carstensen

Hashemi

Hoffmann

et al. 2020

Ambio

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“…These bioreactors are based on microbial conversion of NO 3 − to atmospheric N gases and are well suited to treat the polluted water coming directly from subsurface drains [ 7 , 8 ]. Nitrate removal may be virtually complete under conditions with high hydraulic residence time and temperature [ 9 ], but WBRs typically show annual mean efficiencies of about 50% [ 10 , 11 , 12 ]. This reflects that the NO 3 − removal efficiency may drop to 10–20% at low water temperatures (~5 °C), due to the temperature response of the woodchip microbiome [ 11 , 12 , 13 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Nitrate removal may be virtually complete under conditions with high hydraulic residence time and temperature [ 9 ], but WBRs typically show annual mean efficiencies of about 50% [ 10 , 11 , 12 ]. This reflects that the NO 3 − removal efficiency may drop to 10–20% at low water temperatures (~5 °C), due to the temperature response of the woodchip microbiome [ 11 , 12 , 13 ]. This drop in NO 3 − removal efficiency is a notable drawback in climate zones where the temperature is low during the main agricultural drainage season [ 14 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Temperature Sensitivity and Composition of Nitrate-Reducing Microbiomes from a Full-Scale Woodchip Bioreactor Treating Agricultural Drainage Water

et al. 2021

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Denitrifying woodchip bioreactors (WBR), which aim to reduce nitrate (NO3−) pollution from agricultural drainage water, are less efficient when cold temperatures slow down the microbial transformation processes. Conducting bioaugmentation could potentially increase the NO3− removal efficiency during these specific periods. First, it is necessary to investigate denitrifying microbial populations in these facilities and understand their temperature responses. We hypothesized that seasonal changes and subsequent adaptations of microbial populations would allow for enrichment of cold-adapted denitrifying bacterial populations with potential use for bioaugmentation. Woodchip material was sampled from an operating WBR during spring, fall, and winter and used for enrichments of denitrifiers that were characterized by studies of metagenomics and temperature dependence of NO3− depletion. The successful enrichment of psychrotolerant denitrifiers was supported by the differences in temperature response, with the apparent domination of the phylum Proteobacteria and the genus Pseudomonas. The enrichments were found to have different microbiomes’ composition and they mainly differed with native woodchip microbiomes by a lower abundance of the genus Flavobacterium. Overall, the performance and composition of the enriched denitrifying population from the WBR microbiome indicated a potential for efficient NO3− removal at cold temperatures that could be stimulated by the addition of selected cold-adapted denitrifying bacteria.

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“…Nitrate‐nitrogen removal rate (NRR) of WDBRs is strongly dependent on hydraulic residence time (HRT) and temperature (Hoffman, Larsen, & Kjaergaard, 2019; Hoover, Bhandari, Soupir, & Moorman, 2016). Bioreactors typically operate with HRTs from 6 to 20 h (Addy et al., 2016), with longer times required during colder springtime conditions (Hoover et al., 2016) when a substantial portion of annual tile drainage flows in the northern U.S. Corn Belt (Jin & Sands, 2003).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nitrate removal and nitrous oxide production from upflow and downflow column woodchip bioreactors

Feyereisen

Spokas

Strock

et al. 2020

Agricultural & Env Letters

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Woodchip denitrifying bioreactors (WDBR) reduce off-field tile drainage nitrogen (N) losses from agricultural fields. Limited evaluation exists regarding the influence of flow direction through WDBRs. Changing flow direction could reduce short circuiting. This study evaluated the dependency of nitrate-N removal and dissolved nitrous oxide (dN 2 O) production rates on vertical flow direction in triplicate column bioreactors at 12-h (without carbon dosing) and 2-h (with carbon dosing) hydraulic residence times. Results presented demonstrate that there was no significant difference in overall N removal rates from these column bioreactors as a function of flow direction. There was the suggestion of lower N 2 O production in the downflow direction, although this was not statistically significant due to the high variability of the N 2 O production observed in the upflow direction. Carbon addition led to bioclogging of downflow columns; future work needs to identify dosing rate, placement, and conditions that prevent biofilm formation. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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Nitrogen Removal in Woodchip‐based Biofilters of Variable Designs Treating Agricultural Drainage Discharges

Abstract: The hydraulic design influences seasonal and annual N removal efficiency.• Water temperature and hydraulic residence time control N removal efficiency.• Operational models can be used for dimensioning biofilters for N removal efficiency.

Cited by 18 publications

References 35 publications

Efficiency of mitigation measures targeting nutrient losses from agricultural drainage systems: A review

Efficiency of mitigation measures targeting nutrient losses from agricultural drainage systems: A review

Temperature Sensitivity and Composition of Nitrate-Reducing Microbiomes from a Full-Scale Woodchip Bioreactor Treating Agricultural Drainage Water

Nitrate removal and nitrous oxide production from upflow and downflow column woodchip bioreactors

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