Ubiquity of activated sludge ferricyanide-mediated BOD methods: A comparison of sludge seeds across wastewater treatment plants

Many studies have described alternatives to the BOD5 standard method, with substantial decreases in incubation time observed. However, most of these have not maintained the features that make the BOD5 assay so relevant – a high level of substrate bio-oxidation and use of wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) sludge as the biocatalyst. Two recently described ferricyanide-mediated (FM)-BOD assays, one for trade wastes and one for WWTP influents and treated effluents, satisfy these criteria and were investigated further here for their suitability for use with diverse biocatalysts. Both FM-BOD assays responded proportionately to increasing substrate concentration with sludges from 11 different WWTPs and temporally (months to years) using sludges from a single WWTP, confirming the broad applicability of both assays. Sludges from four WWTPs were selected as biocatalysts for each FM-BOD assay to compare FM-BOD equivalent values with BOD5 (three different sludge seeds) measurements for 12 real wastewater samples (six per assay). Strong and significant relationships were established for both FM-BOD assays. This study has demonstrated that sludge sourced from many WWTPs may be used as the biocatalyst in either FM-BOD assay, as it is in the BOD5 assay. The industry potential of these findings is substantial given the widespread use of the BOD5 assay, the dramatically decreased incubation period (3–6 h) and the superior analytical range of both assays compared to the standard BOD5 assay.