Water oxygenation by fluidic microbubble generator

Abstract

Oxygenation of water by standard means in waste water processing, in particular to improve the conditions for the micro-organisms that decompose organic wastes is rather ineffective. The classical approach to improvements – decreasing the size of the aerator exits - have already reached their limits. A recent new idea is to decrease the size of the generated air bubbles by oscillating the supplied air flow using fluidic oscillators. Authors made extensive performance measurements with an unusual high-frequency fluidic oscillator, designed to operate within the submersed aerator body. The performance was evaluated by the dynamic method of recording the oxygen concentration increase to saturation in the aerated water. Experiments proved the fluidic generator can demonstrably increase the aeration efficiency 4.22-times compared with the aeration from a plain end of a submerged air supply tube. Despite this significant improvement, the behaviour of the generator still provides an opportunity for further improvements.