Biological treatment of N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) and N-nitrodimethylamine (NTDMA) in a field-scale fluidized bed bioreactor.

The ex situ treatment of N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) and N-nitrodimethylamine (NTDMA) in groundwater was evaluated in a field-scale fluidized bed bioreactor (FBR). Both of these compounds, which originally entered groundwater at the test site from the use of liquid rocket propellant, are suspected human carcinogens. The objective of this research was to examine the application of a novel field-scale propane-fed fluidized bed bioreactor as an alternative to ultraviolet irradiation (UV) for treating NDMA and NTDMA to low part-per-trillion (ng/L) concentrations. Previous laboratory studies have shown that the bacterium Rhodococcus ruber ENV425 can biodegrade NDMA and NTDMA during growth on propane as a primary substrate and that the strain can effectively reduce NDMA concentrations in propane-fed bench-scale bioreactors of different design. R. ruber ENV425 was used as a seed culture for the FBR, which operated at a fluidization flow of ∼19 L-per-min (LPM) and received propane, oxygen, and inorganic nutrients in the feed. The reactor effectively treated ∼1 μg/L of influent NDMA to effluent concentrations of less than 10 ng/L at a hydraulic residence time (HRT) of only 10 min. At a 20 min HRT, the FBR reduced NDMA to <4.2 ng/L in the effluent, which was the discharge limit at the test site where the study was conducted. Similarly, NTDMA was consistently treated in the FBR from ∼0.5 μg/L to <10 ng/L at an HRT of 10 min or longer. Based on these removal rates, the average NDMA and NTDMA elimination capacities achieved were 2.1 mg NDMA treated/m of expanded bed/hr of operation and 1.1 mg NTDMA treated/m of expanded bed/hr of operation, respectively. The FBR system was highly resilient to upsets including power outages. Treatment of NDMA, but not NTDMA, was marginally affected when trace co-contaminants including trichloroethene (TCE) and trichlorofluoromethane (Freon 11) were initially added to feed groundwater, but performance recovered over a few weeks in the continued presence of these compounds. Strain ENV425 appeared to be replaced by native propanotrophs over time based on qPCR analysis, but contaminant treatment was not diminished. The results suggest that a FBR can be a viable alternative to UV treatment for removing NDMA from groundwater.