Resumen:
The operational flexibility of Sequencing Batch Reactors (SBR) makes this technology especially resilient to changes in functional requirements. A main feature of SBRs is that plant upgrading from nitrogen to phosphorus removal specifications becomes straightforward by simple adaptation of the manipulated variables. In contrast, the optimum design and operation of these processes is an intricate problem whose formulation involves multiple considerations such as mathematical descriptions for both biological transformations and solids separation phenomena, design procedures for air diffusers, etc. Moreover, the dynamic nature of SBRs adds extra complexity when it comes to solving optimization problems for this technology. In this paper, a model-based optimization framework is proposed to solve the optimum design and operation of SBR systems. This framework splits the whole problem into two single objective optimization sub-problems. The dimensions of the SBR are first calculated; Then, the operational costs in the long-term are optimized. A case-study for a population of 100000 inhabitant-equivalent demonstrates the potential of the framework.
