High resolution heterogeneous profiling and modeling in wastewater systems using milli-electrode array (MEA) for energy-saving

High energy consumption and low efficiency is a critical issue for wastewater treatment systems currently monitored using “single point” probes with delay feedback control. This challenge is approached by profiling three critical water quality parameters (conductivity, temperature and pH) along the reactor depth at high resolution in a real-time mode using milli-electrode array (MEA). The Computational fluid dynamic (CFD) and data-driven models respectively established which showed similar profiling pattern as the experiments decoded the reactor black-box system, and provided an effective method to optimize the chemical dosage and energy requirement. Monte Carlo simulation demonstrated that MEA application can save 59.50% of energy consumption and 45.29% of chemical dosage, and reach 116.28% efficiency, compared with “single-point” sensors. This study indicated that the MEA has a great potential to provide complete datasets for accurate control, and ultimately lead to energy-saving operation with high resilience.