Modeling and calibration of a full-scale wastewater treatment plant using GPS-X model (A case study of Tehran)

Abstract

Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) play a significant role in sustainability due to integration of resource recovery and health management during clean water production. Mathematical modeling has become a vital tool for sustainable wastewater management, especially for simulating complex procedures involved in activated sludge processes. Wastewater process modeling provides more options for upgrades and improvements of operational controls. In this paper, a systematic approach was undertaken to create a plant-wide model for a full-scale plant located in Tehran, Iran, namely the Southern Tehran WWTP, using GPS-X software. The characterization of the influent composition to satisfy the mass balance is the most critical step of modeling, which can have significant influence on simulation accuracy. Therefore, the influent wastewater was initially characterized and carefully analyzed carefully. Then, the model has been calibrated followed by model validation using the collected data. For calibration of the model, the sensitivity of various stoichiometric and kinetic parameters in the GPS-X was analyzed and screened. In this regard, the average absolute relative error was employed to show the agreement between the simulated and measured values. Finally, the calibrated model was validated using the actual input and output data. The results indicate that the model's accuracy was acceptable, and therefore the developed model can be applied for future studies. D