Phosphate recycling in the phosphorus industry
Willem Schipper*1, Bram Klapwijk2, Berend Potjer3, Wim Rulkens2, Hardy Temmink2, Ferdinand Kiestra4 and Dees
Lijmbach1
*corresponding author
1
Thermphos International B.V., PO Box 406, 4380 AK Vlissingen, The Netherlands; schipper@thermphos.com
2
Wageningen University, Subdepartment Environmental Technology, P.O. Box 8129, 6700 EV Wageningen, the
Netherlands; Bram.Klapwijk@Algemeen.mt.wag-ur.nl
3
CE (solutions for environment, economy and technology), Oude Delft 180, 2611 HH Delft, The Netherlands;
potjer@ce.nl
4
Haskoning Consultants, Barbarossastraat 35, Postbus 151, NL 6500 AD Nijmegen, The Netherlands;
fdgk@haskoning.nl
ABSTRACT
The feasibility of phosphate recycling into the phosphate industry at white phosphorus production furnaces in Holland
is discussed. Several types of materials may be recycled, provided they are dry inorganic materials, low in iron, copper
and zinc. Sewage sludge ash may be used so long as iron has not been added for phosphate precipitation in the
treatment plant. The recycling value of the ash is increased where calcium, aluminium or biological methods have been
used for phosphate removal in sewage works, but copper and zinc will in all cases be present in problematic
concentrations. Side stream P recovery as Ca- or Al-phosphates, using specific processes within sewage works, is
therefore a more feasible option and is discussed in detail. Manure ash also has too high levels of copper and zinc, but it
may be possible to modify this by changing animal feed regimes. Recycling phosphates from varying industrial sources
is also possible in many cases.
INTRODUCTION
Interest in phosphate recycling is steadily increasing in the industrialised world. There are large amounts of phosphate
available in waste streams from e.g. agriculture, sewage treatment and from industrial side streams. Since regulations
for discharge into the environment are becoming increasingly strict, these phosphate streams pose an increasing
problem. The easiest solution, landfill, is increasingly inaccessible because of regulatory, social or economic pressures
in most industrialised countries. Therefore, other possibilities have to be explored to dispose of these secondary
phosphates.
The phosphate content of these streams make them potentially interesting for the phosphate and fertiliser industries.
One production pathway of the phosphate industry is the operation of furnaces producing elemental white phosphorus.
Worldwide, this process is limited to China, North America and Europe. The only white phosphorus producer in
Western Europe is Thermphos International, located in Vlissingen, on the coast of The Netherlands. The company has
decided to replace 40 kt/year of their P 2O5 intake (17.5 kt P, currently supplied by imported phosphate rock) by
recovered materials. It is expected that this will bring advantages to both the suppliers of the recovered material, and the
P producer; there will be disposal cost savings for the suppliers, and raw material savings for the phosphorus producer.
This article will present a review of the possibilities for phosphate recycling in the phosphorus furnace process, with a
focus on the situation in The Netherlands. Potential P sources are discussed, along with the most important limitations
for re-use in the P furnace process, and ways forward will be suggested.
LIMITATIONS FOR PHOSPHATE RECYCLING IN THE PHOSPHORUS PROCESS
The phosphorus process
The phosphorus process is depicted in fig. 1. It starts with a granulation step for the phosphate rock (calcium apatite,
Ca5(PO4)3OH/F), where a binder (clay) is added as a slurry on a rotating dish, together with ground rock. This
granulation is necessary to prevent blocking of the furnaces by dust. The pellets which are obtained in this way are dried
and sintered at 800 °C. This rock treatment is necessary to prevent blocking further downstream. The rock pellets are
then mixed with cokes (carbon = reducing agent) and pebbles (SiO 2, for slag formation) and fed into a furnace. The
furnace is heated to 1500 °C by passing a large current through three carbon electrodes in the furnace.
At this elevated temperature, phosphate is reduced to P 4. This leaves the furnace as a gas, together with the by-product
CO and some dust. This dust is removed in an electrostatic precipitator and recycled into the process. The P4 is then
condensed. The resulting CO gas stream is used as fuel for the sintering plant and other on-site processes. The calcium
oxide which is left in the furnace after the phosphate has reacted, combines with the SiO2 to form a liquid slag. This
slag is tapped, cooled and crushed. It is used for e.g. road construction.
Trace amounts of iron are also reduced in the furnace. These form a separate slag, ferrophosphorus, which contains
roughly 75% Fe and 25% P, with small amounts of other metals. There is a small market for this product as a steel
additive.
The usual route for phosphate recycling is to mix the material with the rock before the grinding stage.
The high-temperature phosphorus process is generally seen as a robust process. In practice, however, the quality
requirements for the raw materials can be strict. Certain types of impurities in particular can lead to large problems. The
main restrictions are:
1 the material should contain a sufficient amount of phosphate,
2 the amount of certain impurities should not exceed a critical value
3 it should be obtainable as a dry material (in principle)
4 it should not contain large amounts of organic material or ammonium
5 it should not interfere with the granulation and sintering process
These restrictions are discussed in some detail below.
Phosphate content
The typical P2O5 content of phosphate rock is 30-40% (= 13-17.5% P) The phosphate content of waste streams is
usually lower. If the remainder is made up by inorganic compounds, this will lead to more slag per tonne of P 4. This
will affect the energy efficiency of the process negatively. The heat in slag is lost since it requires a special cooling
process in order to make it suitable for civil engineering purposes. The slag takes up a substantial amount, about onethird, of the total electricity consumption of the process; therefore extra slag should be avoided if possible. On the other
hand, if the remainder of the secondary stream consists of SiO2, this has no effect on the energy balance since the
process requires the addition of SiO2 anyway. Aluminium compounds may replace SiO 2 in slag formation, so that
recovered aluminium phosphates would make a good raw material for the process.
Impurities
Since the phosphorus furnace is a reduction process, it also reduces every (trace) element present which is more easily
reduced than phosphorus. The most notable are:

Iron. This forms a separate slag and effectively removes phosphorus from the process. The compound formed is an
alloy between Fe and P, with 25% P by weight. The presence of large amounts of iron poses P-depreciation and
capacity problems, and the market potential for this side stream is limited. Only one third of the phosphorus present
in FePO4 is released as P4 ; the remainder will end up in the ferrophosphorus.

Zinc. This metal is volatilised in the furnace and subsequently precipitated on the furnace dust. Since this is
recycled, zinc tends to build up in the system. This makes (costly) purges necessary. Similar problems are expected
for other volatile metals like lead, cadmium and tin.

Chloride causes corrosion damage to the granulation/sintering plant, where metal parts are exposed to the raw
materials at high temperatures.

Copper ends up in the ferrophosphorus. This material is mainly used by the steel industry. A significant increase in
the copper content would limit the application potential of this side stream.
Water content
Phosphate rock is usually supplied as a dry material. A considerable number of waste treatment processes generate wet
sludges of organic or inorganic phosphates. The P process cannot use wet material on a large scale because of technical
limitations (mixing, milling, interference with internal sludge processing capacity). Drying materials on-site could solve
this problem, but there is no waste (low-grade) heat source available, so that drying would involve energy purchase and
consumption and so be costly. More importantly, it is economically and ecologically undesirable to transport materials
with a high water content.
Organic material and ammonium
The presence of significant amounts of organic material lead to a decreased pellet strength after sintering. This will
seriously limit the capacity of the plant, and therefore the economic and energy efficiency. Therefore, the material
should consist of inorganic phosphates only (max. 5% carbon).
Also, nitrogen present in recovered materials would cause a serious emission or gas scrubbing problem in the sintering
stage, since NH3 will be volatilised and oxidised to nitrous/nitric oxides. This would be a major obstacle to the use of
recovered struvite (magnesium ammonium phosphate) as a feed material for the process.
Pellet strength
If the presence of a secondary material leads to decreased phosphate pellet strength, for instance due to the presence of
large amounts of alkali metal salts, this will limit the plant capacity (see under Organic material)
SEWAGE AS A SOURCE OF SECONDARY PHOSPHATES
In 1998 the Dutch sewage contained a total of around 14,000 tonnes/year phosphorus (P) [1]. In the wastewater
treatment plants about 10 kt P/year was removed by chemical and biological treatment methods. The result of expected
improvements in water treatment will be to increase this amount even further to approximately 12 kt P/year. Almost all
the removed phosphorus is fixed in the primary and secondary sewage sludge. This sludge is treated and disposed of in
several ways, but not more than 14% has a useful application as compost (table 1). Disposal of sewage sludge by
agricultural land spreading is no longer an option in The Netherlands so the amount of sludge incinerated will increase.
Sludge disposal and utilisation
Sewage sludge
(Dry mass)
kton
%
Incineration
Controlled disposal
Compost
Other applications
Wet oxidation
162
101
48
27
12
46
29
14
8
3
Total
350
100
Table 1 Disposal and utilisation of sewage sludge in 1998
The following three streams were identified as potential sources of recovered phosphates from municipal sewage :
A) sewage sludge : the sludge from sewage works operating chemical (chem-P) or biological (bio-P) phosphorus
removal offers relatively high phosphorus contents;
B) end products of sewage sludge processing (incineration, drying, composting, wet thermal oxidation …);
C) specific phosphate products produced by separate stream processing in (bio-P plants only taken into consideration).
Sewage sludge (A) cannot be used directly as it satisfies none of the defined quality criteria. After drying, the sludge
has an appropriately low water content, but its organics content is still too high. After composting or wet thermal
oxidation, it would still need to be incinerated.
Options B and C on the other hand offer recycling possibilities which are discussed below.
Fig. 2 represents a typical waste water treatment plant (WWTP). The sludge, which contains most of the P, is collected ,
thickened and digested. The final step is incineration in many cases. This takes place in central incineration plants.
The incinerator ash contains a significant proportion of dry iron- calcium- and/or aluminium phosphates, along with
silicates, with up to 16% P2O5 (7% P) The large iron content of this ash, up to 10%, currently prevents use in the
phosphorus process, since the amount of ferrophosphorus formed would exceed the processing capacity and the re-use
application potential for this stream (phosphate rock typically contains only 0.4-1% of Fe). Iron originates mainly from
the phosphate precipitation step in sewage treatment plants using chemical P-precipitation.
The iron used in sewage works P-removal can be replaced by aluminium or possibly calcium, which would make ash
processing in the P process much more feasible. At present, the use of aluminium in wastewater treatment is more
costly, and calcium use in existing sewage works processes can cause sludge handling problems; it has to be evaluated
whether the positive effect on the ash side will compensate for this. The general, government-induced tendency away
from landfilling and towards recycling may be helpful here.
Bio-P removal
The problems associated with iron can also be avoided when the ash from sludge from biological phosphate removal
treatment plants (bio-P plants) is used. The logistics for collecting ash from bio-P plants separately is not simple.
Nevertheless , we here examine whetherthis type of ash meets the specifications of the phosphorus industry.
In bio-P plants (Figure 3) an environment is created for the proliferation of bacteria that accumulate phosphate in excess
of normal metabolic requirements. In particular, a combination of an anaerobic compartment in the beginning and an
aerobic compartment at the end is important for the biological removal of phosphate. In the anaerobic compartment
phosphate is released, whereas in the aerobic compartment the bacteria take up phosphate. The result is a net uptake of
phosphate. As with chemical precipitation, the excess sludge produced by bio-P-removal has a high phosphate
concentration, but the iron concentration is much lower since it is no longer necessary to remove phosphate chemically.
In table 2 the quality of ash from secondary sludge from bio-P plants is compared with the requirements for reuse by the
phosphorus industry. The ash from bio-P plants has a higher phosphate concentration than ash from mixture of all the
WWTP’s (i.e. chemical P removal for the majority of the WWTP’s) and is more or less at the same level as phosphate
rock (30-40%). The iron content is close to the limit given by the P process. Since the iron in bioP sludge mainly
originates from a small dosage during sludge digestion, the Fe content may be further reduced by using Al or Ca here
and in this case, only small quantities are used so that the obstacles to this change are not as important as in chem-P
plants.
Ash from current
sewage sludge (primary
+ secondary sludge)
Ash from bio-P sludge
(secondary sludge)
Requirements for reuse
by the phosphorus
industry
P2O5
(g/kg ash)
190
Copper
(mg/kg ash)
1600
Zinc
(mg/kg ash)
3500
Iron
(g/kg ash)
100
360
1500
3100
16
> 250
 500
 100
 10
Table 2 Quality of sewage ash compared with the requirements of the P industry (Thermphos)
It can thus be concluded that iron levels from bioP sludge ash can be readily rendered compatible with the phosphate
industry’s requirements.
However, all types of main-stream sludge ash contain considerable amounts of zinc and copper. These cannot
realistically be avoided, as they come from a wide range of sources including water piping and foods. The amounts of
zinc and especially copper represent a very significant limit to the recycling capacity of this material in the P process.
Side stream recovery
It is also possible to recover phosphate selectively, at the treatment plant itself, especially at bio-P plants. We will
discuss two alternatives for phosphate recovery at these plants. The first alternative is known as the Phostrip-process
[2]. In this case (fig 4) a part of the return sludge is recycled through a stripper. In the anaerobic stripper the phosphate
is released from the sludge. The sludge and water are separated in a settler. The sludge is returned to the anaerobic
compartment and the phosphate rich water is transferred to a precipitation reactor. Lime or aluminium salts should be
used as precipitation agent rather than iron salts, because iron is not accepted by the phosphorus industry.
In the Netherlands the treatment plant of Geestmerambacht is working according to this approach. There the phosphate
is precipitated in a Crystallactor®, a specially designed precipitation reactor which produces phosphate pellets with less
than 20% moisture. In table 4 the quality of the precipitate from that plant is compared with the P industry
requirements. Recovering of phosphate at a bio-P plant with the Phostrip method is a good alternative.
Phostrip phosphorus
precipitate
(Crystalactor®)
Requirements P
industry
P2O5
(g/kg ash)
260
Copper
(mg/kg ash)
1.6
Zinc
(mg/kg ash)
35
Iron
(g/kg ash)
-
> 250
 500
 1000
 10
Table 3 Quality of the precipitate compared with the requirements of the P industry
The second alternative to recover phosphate at a bio-P plant is demonstrated in figure 5. In this approach the excess
sludge (a mixture of sludge and water) is withdrawn from the anaerobic compartment instead of from the sludge return
flow (see for example Figure 2). In the anaerobic compartment the phosphate that was accumulated in excess of the
normal metabolic uptake, has already been released from sludge. The phosphate containing water is separated from the
sludge in a thickener. In the precipitation reactor this phosphate has to be precipitated with lime or aluminium salts.
After precipitation the water is returned to the activated sludge plant. The quality of the precipitate if a Crystalactor
were used would be about the same as in the Phostrip approach and meets the quality requirements of the phosphorus
industry.
In the BCFS-process [3] this approach is already used, especially in cases where the biological P-removal isn’t
sufficient to achieve discharge limits. However in their approach the sludge is also returned to the activated sludge
plant. It is however more efficient to discharge the excess sludge from the anaerobic compartment. The effect of
withdrawing excess sludge from the anaerobic compartment at the bio-P process should be investigated.
By recovering phosphate in a sidestream using these different methods, it isn’t possible to recover all the removed
phosphorus. A part of the phosphorus is used for normal metabolic needs and this phosphorus will not be released in an
anaerobic phase. At the COD/P ratio as is found in the influx of WWTP’s in the Netherlands, about 75 % of the
phosphate removed can be recovered in a side stream, and 25 % leaves the wastewater treatment plant with the excess
sludge.
The implementation of this technology at all WWTP’s in the Netherlands would be costly. However, it would be
possible to collect all filter-pressed bio-P sludges separately, transport them to a treatment plant near the central
incinerator, and perform the side stream P recovery in one large reactor as described above. The sludge could then be
pressed again and incinerated; also, the phosphate would become available at one site which will make transport to the
P plant easier.
Current situation in The Netherlands
The next item to be discussed is the amount of phosphate that can be recovered from Dutch sewage. First of all we will
have look how many wastewater treatment plants are already using biological P-removal. According to an inquiry about
90 of the 414 wastewater treatment plants already use biological P removal in their process (Figure 6). We cannot
conclude that also 22 % of the secondary sludge is from bio-P plants as the mean load of the bio-P plants is lower than
the mean load of all the plants.
To have an idea of how much phosphate can be recovered theoretically we have calculated how much phosphate would
be removed in each province in case the phosphate concentration in the effluents of the plants were lowered to 1 mg/l.
Next we assumed that 65% of the removed phosphate could be recovered in a sidestream precipitation reactor in case all
the plants had biological P-removal (Figure 7). The total amount of phosphate that can theoretically be recovered is
about 18 kt P2O5/year (8 kt P/year).
MANURE AS A SOURCE OF SECONDARY PHOSPHATES
In countries with intensive livestock agriculture, such as the Netherlands, animal manure storage and disposal poses a
large problem. In The Netherlands, the production of manure exceeds the need for nutrients of the land and agricultural
spreading of the manure can lead to excess fertilisation and eutrophication. In order to protect the environment and the
water quality, regulators have set limits to the allowed amount of nutrients to be spread on land. It is thus not possible to
dispose of all the manures produced by land spreading, and several projects have been started dispose of manures in
some other useful way.
These projects include drying the manure or concentrating it so it can be transported to areas where the nutrient limits
have not been reached yet. At the moment, however, there is still a manure/nutrient surplus in all areas of The
Netherlands, and different approaches are needed.
The phosphate in the manures could also be used as a raw material for the P industry. In untreated manure, the organic
and water content are high and the phosphate content is low, so it needs to be incinerated before usage in the P industry.
The total yearly amount of P in Netherland pig and poultry manures is 86,000 tonnes P. In theory, the phosphorus
furnaces at Vlissingen could recycle a considerable amount of this phosphate and help solve the manure surplus
problem of The Netherlands. A major advantage of this is that the phosphate would be taken out of the agricultural P
cycle, which is an objective of government environment policy. Unlike agricultural spreading of manures, the P
industry can take recovered phosphates all year round, avoiding manure storage problems.
Where the manure does not have too high a water content, it may be incinerated without further drying, and the released
energy may be converted to electricity. Amongst other projects, a large scale plant for poultry manure incineration in
Moerdijk, the Netherlands, is currently being engineered. The residue of this process is a dry product containing a high
proportion of calcium phosphate. Unfortunately, the zinc and copper content are at present relatively high, just as is the
case with sewage sludge ash, and this could prevent the use of significant amounts of manure ash by the P industry. Pig
manure poses the same problem. Copper and zinc originate from animal feeds. These metals are also becoming
increasingly problematic for other manure applications, such as agricultural spreading, and it is expected that the Cu and
Zn content in manure ash will decrease in the future. It may also be feasible to develop a process that separates the
metals out of the phosphate present in the ash.
ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS
The economic effects of using these phosphate sources (manures and sewage) in the elementary phosphorus industry,
instead of disposal by agricultural spreading, have been compared with the environmental effects. These effects include
the substitution of phosphate rock consumption, avoidance of agricultural spreading (and thus excess fertilisation) and
the drying and incineration of the manure. The environmental effects are expressed in terms of money using the
“shadow price” method. This is a method to give prices to products for which there is no market yet. To find these
prices for environmental effects we use the preventative cost method. This method assumes that the (Netherlands)
government sets environmental targets, and that in order to reach these targets measures have to be taken. The second
assumption is that the targets have to be reached at the lowest cost. Therefore the most expensive measure that still has
to be taken to reach the environmental target would be the market price if there were a market for reduction of
environmental impact. This price on this virtual market is the shadow price for the reduction of the environmental
impact (for CO2, for example, this is about 0,10 NLG per kg, for more information see www.ce.nl or [4]). The
economic and environmental impact of using the phosphate in the process itself is not taken into account. Using the
described parameters, the environmental and economic benefits of using manures in the elementary phosphorus industry
in The Netherlands results in fig.8.
When we evaluate the usage of sewage sludge as a phosphorus source for the elementary phosphorus industry in the
Netherlands in the same way it results in environmental and economical benefits according to fig. 9. The assumptions in
this case are: treatment of sludge is avoided, phosphate rock is (partially) substituted, the sludge is dried and incinerated
if necessary and the effects in the P industry itself are not taken into account.
INDUSTRIAL AND FOOD INDUSTRY WASTE STREAMS
Many industries produce phosphate waste streams, for example food and dairy processing, metal treatment and etching,
electronics manufacturing and other processes that use phosphorus, phosphoric acid or phosphates. A large variety of
phosphate-containing wet and dry materials result from the treatment of these waste streams. In The Netherlands these
contain at least 5 kt/y (as P). A large part of these materials is suitable for processing in the P process, depending on the
nature of the material.
A significant problem in using secondary phosphates, particularly from other countries, is the waste legislation. It is
usually not permitted to transport waste across the border, and many secondary phosphates are currently classified as
waste. There is need for less rigid legislation and regulation on national and European scale, especially regarding the
difference between waste materials and recyclable raw materials. This should prevent landfill of valuable materials. The
current legislation creates barriers which discourage or prevent recycling.
CONCLUSIONS
We conclude that there is potential for P recycling in the phosphorus process, but there are many practical difficulties to
be overcome. P from sewage sludge has excellent recycling potential in the P process, provided appropriate techniques
for side-stream recovery are applied enabling recovery of a material which does not contain significant levels of the
contaminants Cu and Zn. These metals render even bioP sludge unsuitable for recycling (no feasible process for
separating these metals is available today). As for existing streams of sewage sludge incineration ash, the high iron
content of these makes recycling in the P process virtually impossible.
Recycling from industrial waste streams is possible in many cases, but depends on the source and nature of the material.
The presence of copper and zinc in manure ash also makes recycling difficult at present . Solutions may include
processes which recover the phosphates without these impurities, changes to animal feed regimes which reduce copper
and zinc levels or possible processes to extract these metals from recovered materials.
Adaptations in legislation could facilitate the development of recovery for recycling, and accelerate the closing of the P
cycle.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors acknowledge the contributions of the students Kerstens, Loeffen, Meulepas, Spijker and Van den Bosch to this paper.
REFERENCES
1. CBS (2000) Waterkwaliteitsbeheer. Zuivering van afvalwater, 1998, CBS, Voorburg/Heerlen, 59 pp.
2. Levin, G.V. and Shapiro, J. (1965) Metabolic uptake of phosphorus by wastewater organisms. J.
Wat. Poll. Control Fed. 37, 800-821
3. Loosdrecht, M.C.M. van, Brandse, F.A. and Vries, A.C. de (1998) Upgrading of waste water
treatment processes for integrated nutrient removal- The BCFS® process. Wat. Sci. Tech. 37, 209217.
4. Van Soest, J.P., Sas, H. and Wit, G. de (1997) Apples and Oranges, CE , Delft
5. Potjer, B., Vermeulen, J., Weerd, G. de, Bergsma, G. en Croezen, H (2000) Fosforkringloop voor
Thermphos, CE, Delft
Figure 1 The phosphorus production process
Settler
Aeration tank
Settler
Excess Secondary Sludge
Primary Sludge
Sludge treatment.
Final step:incineration
Ash with phosphate
Figure 2 Wastewater treatment and sludge treatment
Anaerobic
Anoxic
Aerobic
Settler
Sludge treatment.
Final step:incineration
Ash with phosphate
Figure 3 Biological phosphorus removal and sludge treatment
Anaerobic
Anoxic
P-precipitation
Aerobic
Settler
P-stripper
Phosphate precipitate
Excess sludge
Figure 4 Scheme of a bio-P plant with phosphorus stripping
Sludge Thickener
P-precipitation
Phosphate precipitate
Excess sludge
Anaerobic
Anoxic
Aerobic
Settler
Figure 5 Scheme with phosphorus recover from the anaerobic phase
Wate water treatment plants in the Netherlands
90
80
70
number
60
50
Bio-P plants
Total plants
40
30
20
10
0
Groningen
Friesland
Drente
Overijssel
Flevoland
Gelderland
Utrecht
Noord Holland Zuid Holland Noord Brabant
Limburg
Figure 6 Wastewater treatment plants with biological P-removal in the different provinces
Zeeland
maximum P2O5 recycling per province
4000
3500
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
Figure 7 Maximum amount of P2O5 that can be recycled in the Netherlands via bio-P plants
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Source:
raw manure
concentrated manure
stackable poultry manure
compost from poultry manure
ash from poultry manure
environmental benefit (E)
return (C)
environmental benefit and return (dutch guilders)
Figure 8 Environmental and financial effects in the phosphorus chain of
utilisation of manure at Thermphos (from [5])
Source:
mixed raw sludge
mixed sludge compost
mixed dried sludge
mixed sludge ash
environmental benefit (E)
return (C)
environmental benefit and return (dutch guilders)
Figure 9 Environmental and financial effects in the phosphorus chain of
utilisation of sewage sludge at Thermphos (from [5])
FIGURE CAPTIONS
Figure 1 The phosphorus production process
Figure 2 Wastewater treatment and sludge treatment
Figure 3 Biological phosphorus removal and sludge treatment
Figure 4 Scheme of a bio-P plant with phosphorus stripping
Figure 5 Scheme with phosphorus recover from the anaerobic phase
Figure 6 Wastewater treatment plants with biological P-removal in the different provinces
Figure 7 Maximum amount of P2O5 that can be recycled in the Netherlands via bio-P plants
Figure 8 Environmental and financial effects in the phosphorus chain of utilisation of manure at Thermphos (from [5])
Figure 9 Environmental and financial effects in the phosphorus chain of utilisation of sewage sludge at Thermphos
(from [5])