Animal manures contain nutrients [primarily nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P)] and organic material that are beneficial to crops. Unfortunately, for economic and logistics reasons, dairy manure tends to be applied to soils near where it is generated. Over time P concentrations in soils where dairy manure is applied builds up, and is often in excess of crop demands. We previously described, and have subsequently built, a full-scale version of a MAnure PHosphorus EXtraction (MAPHEX) System capable of removing greater than 90 percent of the P from manures. While originally designed to remove phosphorus, we postulated that the MAPHEX System was also capable of removing odor and microbes, and of concentrating alkalinity into a solid, economically transported form. In this study the MAPHEX System was shown to be highly versatile at removing greater than 90 % of the phosphorus from a wide range of dairy manures. In addition to that, the study showed that the System is also capable of concentrating and recovering alkalinity from manures, while also removing over 80 % of microbes and reducing the odor of the effluent applied to fields by half. We have also lowered daily operating costs by testing the effect of lower-cost chemicals as alternatives to ferric sulfate, and by showing that the diatomaceous earth (DE) filtering material can be recycled and reused.
Corresponding author
Clinton Church (USDA-ARS)
Other authors
Kleinman, Peter (USDA-ARS); Hristov, Alex (Pennsylvania State University); Bryant, Ray (USDA-ARS)
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