ECW 567 – Water & Wastwater Engineering

Topic:
SEDIMENTATION

Week 4

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At the end of this lesson, students should be able
to:

1. Apply engineering principles in the analysis of

treatment systems for water supply .
(CO1-PO3)

2. Discuss issues related on the water treatment

system and its impact to environment, economic
and social (CO2-PO7)

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Engineered Water Systems

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 Group discussion
• Do we need ACTIVATED SLUDGE in
WATER TREATMENT SYSTEM?
*** Group discussion for 5 mins.

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Typical surface water treatment process

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 Surface water treatment process
Primary objectives are to
1. Remove suspended material (turbidity) and color
2. Eliminate pathogenic organisms

Treatment technologies largely based on coagulation and

flocculation

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 SEDIMENTATION
▪ Particles that will settle within a reasonable period of time
can be removed in a sedimentation basin (also called a
clarifier).
▪ Basins are usually rectangular or circular with either a
radial or upward water flow pattern.
▪ The design can be divided into 4 zones – inlet, settling,
outlet, and sludge storage.

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 Fig 6-28
Zones of sedimentation
a) Horizontal flow clarifier
b) Upflow clarifier

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▪ The inlet zone is used to evenly distribute the flow and
suspended particles across the cross section of the
settling zone
▪ It consists of a series of inlet pipes and baffles
▪ If the tank is long enough, storage depth can be provided
by the bottom slope; if not, a sludge hopper is necessary
at the inlet end or the overall tank is made deeper.
▪ Mechanically-cleaned basins may be equipped with a
bottom scraper as shown in Figure 6-29 for a circular
tank

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Figure 6-29
Photograph and
schematic diagram of
circular sludge scraper

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For horizontal tanks a bottom collection device is used such
as shown in Fig 6-30 below.

Fig 6-30 Vacuum sludge collection

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▪ The inlet zone is designed to remove the settled water
from the basin without carrying away any of the floc
particles.
▪ Within the sedimentation tank, the flow goes through a
large area, hence, the velocity is low. To remove the
water, if a pipe is used, the velocity will increase, which
will raise the settled floc from the basin (scouring).
▪ To avoid this, it is desirable to put a series of weirs, which
will provide a large area for the water to flow through and
minimize the velocity in the sedimentation tank at the
outlet zone
▪ The units for weir overflow rates are m3/d.m, which is
water flow (m3/d) per unit length of weir (m)

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 Table 6-11 Typical weir overflow rates
Type of floc Weir overflow rate
3
(m /d.m)
Light alum floc 143 - 179
(low-turbidity water)
Heavier alum floc 179 - 268
(higher-turbidity water)
Heavy alum floc 268 - 322

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Figure 6-31
Weir arrangements:
a) Rectangular
b) circular

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▪ In a rectangular basin, the weirs often cover at least
one-third of the basin length.
▪ Spacing may be as large as 5 to 6 m on-centres but is
frequently on the order of one-half this distance

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 Sedimentation Concepts

▪ Particle (floc) settling velocity, vs

▪ Velocity at which the tank is designed to operate,
called the overflow rate, v0. (m3/d.m2)

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▪ The particles fall downwards while the water rises vertically
▪ The rate at which the particle is settling down is the settling
velocity, vs
▪ The velocity of the liquid rising is the overflow rate, v0
▪ To be removed from the bottom of the clarifier, vs > v0

Fig 6-32 Settling in an upflow clarifier

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 ▪ If vs > v0, we can expect 100% particle removal
▪ If vs < v0, we can expect 0 % removal.
▪ In design, the procedure is to determine vs and set v0 at a
some lower value.
▪ Often v0 is set at 50 to 70 % of vs for an upflow clarifier
▪ The term overflow rate (m3/d.m2) is used since the water is
flowing over the top of the tank into the weir system.
▪ It is also called the surface loading rate
▪ It can be considered as the amount of water that goes
through each m2 of tank surface area per day

Volume
Time (Depth)(Su rface area) Depth
v0 = = = = Liquid velocity
Surface area (Time)(Sur face area) Time
V
t 0 h As h
v0 = = =
As t 0 As t 0
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 Horizontal sedimentation tank
Assumptions for an ideal horizontal sedimentation tank:
1. Particles and velocity vectors are evenly distributed across
the tank cross section. This is the function of the inlet zone
2. The liquid moves as an ideal slug down the length of the
tank.
3. Any hitting the bottom of the tank is removed

To remove particles from water it

must have a settling velocity great
enough so that it reaches the
bottom of the tank during the
detention time

h Figure 6-33
vs = t0 = detention time Ideal horizontal sedimentation tank
t0

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 h h hQ
vs = = = (6.30)
t0 V V
Q

But the tank volume is given by the height x length x width

hQ Q
vs = = (6.31)
l w  h l w
Q
vs = ( 6.32 )
As

This implies that that particle removal in a horizontal clarifier

is independent of depth.

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 Fig 6-34 Partial removal in ideal
sedimentation tank

▪ In a horizontal sedimentation tank (unlike an upflow clarifier), some

percentage of the particles with less than vs will be removed.
▪ Consider particles with settling velocity = 0.5v0 entering uniformly into
the settling zone. 50% of the particles (below half the depth of the
tank) will be removed
▪ Similarly, one-fourth of the particles with settling velocity of 0.25v0 will
be removed
▪ The percentage of particles removed, P, with a settling velocity of vs
in a sedimentation tank designed with an overflow rate v0 is given by:
vs
P= (6.33 )
v0

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 Determination of vs
To design an ideal sedimentation tank, determine the settling
velocity vs and then set the overflow rate v0 at some value less
than or equal to vs. Settling properties of particles can be
categorised into one of three classes:
▪ Type I Sedimentation – Dilute, non-flocculent, free-settling
(discrete). E.g. Sand and grit. Occurs during presedimentation
for sand removal prior to coagulation
▪ Type II Sedimentation - Dilute, flocculent. (Particles can
flocculate as they settle.) Size can change, hence settling
velocity also changes. Occurs in alum or iron coagulation,
primary sedimentation and settling tanks in trickling filtration
▪ Type III or Zone Sedimentation – Concentrated Suspensions (>
1,000 mg/L), Zone Settling. Particles settle in mass and a
distinct clear zone and sludge zone present. Occurs in lime-
softening sedimentation, activated-sludge sedimentation, and
sludge thickeners
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 Types of Sedimentation

Type I Type II Type III

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 Discrete settling
Refer to pages 318-319, Davis & Cornwell
FG = s gVp (6 − 34)
FB = gVp (6 − 35 )
v2
FD = CD Ap  (6 − 36)
2
FG − FB = (s − )gVp (6 − 37)

FG − FB = FD (6 − 38) The terminal settling velocity vs is

achieved
vs
(s − )gVp = CD Ap  (6 − 39)
2
4
For spherical particles
Vp ( d / 2) 3
2d
of diameter d, = 3 = (6 − 40 )
Ap (d / 2)2 3
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 Combining (6-39) and (6-40)
1/ 2
 4g (s − )d 
vs =   (6 − 41)
 3 C D  

▪ The drag coefficient can be obtained below (refer to Fig 6-36)

▪ For high Reynolds number (>104) CD = 0.4
▪ For low Reynolds number (< 0.5) CD = 24/R (6-43)
▪ For the transition (between 0.5 and 104)
24 3
CD = + 1/ 2 + 0.34 (6 − 44 )
R R

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Fig 6-35 Drag coefficient as a function of Reynolds number

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For laminar flow, the Stoke’s law is used

g (s − )d 2
vs = (6 − 45)
18

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 Flocculant settling
▪ Stoke’s law cannot be used. Jar tests are used to
develop design data.
▪ Jar tests can also be used to determine flocculated
particles settling velocity and hence overflow rate.
▪ The settling velocity corresponding to a given turbidity at
time t is given by:
10 cm
vs =
t , min

Typical overflow rates are 0.67 to 1.67 m/h or 1 to 3 cm/min

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Fig 6-37 Jar test settling curve

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Typical detention times for waters coagulated with alum
or iron salts are of the order of 2 to 8 hours.

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