Meeting stringent phosphorus (P) discharge standards remains one of the major challenges for wastewater utilities due to increased economic burdens associated with advanced (i.e., secondary, tertiary) treatment processes. In a trade-off between higher treatment cost and enhanced P removal, it is critical for the treatment plants to be able to select the most appropriate technology. To this end, established/emerging high performing P removal/recovery technologies (e.g., Modified University of Cape Towne process, Bardenpho process, membrane bioreactors, IFAS-EBPR, struvite recovery, tertiary reactive media filtration) were identified and full-scale treatment plant designs were developed. Using advanced mathematical modeling techniques, six different treatment configurations were evaluated in terms of performance and cost effectiveness ($/lb of P removed). Results show that the unit cost for P removal in different treatment alternatives range from $42.22 to $60.88 per lb of P removed. The MUCT BNR + tertiary reactive media filtration proved to be one of the most cost effective configurations ($44.04/lb P removed) delivering an effluent with total P (TP) concentration of only 0.05 mg/L. Although struvite recovery resulted in significant reduction in biosolids P, the decrease in effluent TP was not sufficient to meet very stringent discharge standards.

由于与先进的（即，二级，三级）处理工艺相关的经济负担增加，达到严格的磷（P）排放标准仍然是废水处理厂面临的主要挑战之一。在较高的处理成本和增强的P去除之间进行权衡时，对于处理厂而言，选择最合适的技术至关重要。为此，已确定/已经建立了高性能的磷去除/回收技术（例如，开普敦大学改造工艺，Bardenpho工艺，膜生物反应器，IFAS-EBPR，鸟粪石回收，三次反应介质过滤），并建立了大型处理厂设计被开发。使用先进的数学建模技术，根据性能和成本效益（去除P美元/磅P）评估了六种不同的处理配置。结果表明，在不同的处理方案中，除磷的单位成本为每磅除磷42.22美元至60.88美元。MUCT BNR +三级反应性介质过滤被证明是最具成本效益的配置之一（去除了44.04美元/磅P），提供的废水总P（TP）浓度仅为0.05 mg / L。尽管鸟粪石的回收导致生物固体P的显着减少，但废水TP的降低不足以满足非常严格的排放标准。MUCT BNR +三级反应性介质过滤被证明是最具成本效益的配置之一（去除了44.04美元/磅P），提供的废水总P（TP）浓度仅为0.05 mg / L。尽管鸟粪石的回收导致生物固体P的显着减少，但废水TP的降低不足以满足非常严格的排放标准。MUCT BNR +三级反应性介质过滤被证明是最具成本效益的配置之一（去除了44.04美元/磅P），提供的废水总P（TP）浓度仅为0.05 mg / L。尽管鸟粪石的回收导致生物固体P的显着减少，但废水TP的降低不足以满足非常严格的排放标准。