Research Center
The research center located at the Chair of Urban Water Systems Engineering is a multifaceted facility which regularly conducts process validation studies at both the lab and pilot scales. The center is comprised of an indoor technical laboratory (400 m²) as well as outdoor testing grounds, both having a direct connection to the municipal wastewater treatment plant situated in Garching. This connection is highly advantageous as it provides the facility with not only a fresh supply of raw wastewater, but also wastewater from different stages throughout the treatment process which can directly be used for research purposes. The center is outfitted with a variety of lab and pilot-scaled installations and equipment including sequencing batch reactors, anaerobic reactors, sludge treatment systems (sedimentation basins, filter presses, drying units), membrane systems (ultra and nanofiltration, reverse osmosis), and drinking water treatment technologies (ozone, biologically-active filters, membrane units); the facility is also equipped to sample ground and surface water as well as wastewater. Thus, processes and systems associated with drinking water and wastewater treatment can be investigated and validated at different scales.
The research center additionally has the means to develop as well as optimize and check the performance of treatment technologies for roof and road runoff. At the lab scale, there are a variety of conventional experimental set-ups including batch shaking tests as well as an assortment of column test equipment which can be used to investigate the sorption capacities of different materials for heavy metals and organic matter (petroleum-derived hydrocarbons, PAHs, MTBE). Pilot-scaled experiments investigating the lifetime and performance of decentralized treatment systems can also be conducted using a pre-existing, copper rooftop system outfitted with an automatic sampler, rain gauge, and flowmeter. Additionally, the lifetime of filter material used for the treatment of road runoff can be examined. Moreover, conventional sieve analyses, cation exchange capacities, bulk densities, etc. of the utilized materials can be measured according to standardized methods.