Volume 16, Issue 1 (Autmn 2026)
J. Aqua. Eco 2026, 16(1): 33-48 |
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Akbarzadeh-Chamachaei G, Koohkan H, Saraji F, Mortazavi M S, Mohebbi Nozar L. Synthesis of biochar from municipal sewage sludge and its effectiveness in removing phosphate and nitrate from shrimp farm effluent. J. Aqua. Eco 2026; 16 (1) :33-48
URL: http://jae.hormozgan.ac.ir/article-1-1157-en.html
URL: http://jae.hormozgan.ac.ir/article-1-1157-en.html
Gholamali Akbarzadeh-Chamachaei 
, Hadi Koohkan * , Fereshteh Saraji , Mohammad Seddiq Mortazavi , Laili Mohebbi Nozar
, Hadi Koohkan * , Fereshteh Saraji , Mohammad Seddiq Mortazavi , Laili Mohebbi Nozar
Abstract: (16 Views)
Biochar is a stable, carbon-rich material produced through the pyrolysis of organic matter under limited oxygen conditions. The present study aimed to produce biochar from municipal sewage sludge and evaluate its efficiency in removing nutrients, including nitrate, phosphate, and ammonium, from shrimp farm wastewater. Sewage sludge samples were collected from Bandar Abbas during the spring of 2023 and air-dried prior to processing. The dried samples were compressed in alumina crucibles and pyrolyzed in an electric furnace at temperatures of 300, 400, 500, 600, and 700°C to produce different biochar treatments. Following biochar synthesis, the physicochemical properties of the resulting biochars were characterized. Morphological analyses demonstrated that the synthesized biochars possessed porous structures and greater specific surface areas compared with the original sewage sludge. Elemental analyses further revealed that increasing pyrolysis temperature resulted in higher carbon, nitrogen, and sulfur contents, whereas oxygen content decreased. To evaluate nutrient removal efficiency, the synthesized biochars were applied to shrimp farm wastewater. The results showed that biochar produced at 700°C (BC700) exhibited the highest phosphate removal efficiency, reaching 91.7%. The optimal treatment conditions for phosphate removal were identified as 2.5 g of BC700 with a contact time of 2 h, resulting in approximately 95% phosphate removal from the wastewater. Among all treatments, BC700 also demonstrated the highest nitrate removal efficiency among the non-modified biochars, removing approximately 52% of nitrate. The highest nitrate removal was achieved using 3 g of BC700 with a contact time of 180 min. Furthermore, iron-modified biochar (Fe-BC) significantly enhanced nitrate removal efficiency, achieving up to 98% removal under optimal conditions of 2 g dosage and 2 h contact time. Overall, the findings indicated that BC700 was the most effective biochar for phosphate removal, whereas iron-modified biochar showed superior performance for nitrate removal. The study further demonstrated that the application of sewage sludge-derived biochar can substantially reduce nutrient loads and organic matter in aquaculture wastewater, thereby decreasing the environmental impacts of shrimp farming effluents on aquatic ecosystems.
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons — Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)