Suspended Solids

This chapter shows numerical values of suspended solid contents for different parties. Pathogens tend to hide themselves inside of suspended solids, and even after chlorination, they don’t die. As such, the removal of suspended solids is one of the first stages in water and wastewater treatment plants. Before removal of suspended solids, chlorine can be added (prechlorination), and then after the removal of the total suspended solids (TSS), another dose of chlorine will be added to ensure the pathogens are cleared. The TSS spectrum or range for low concentrations of suspended solids is also shown in this chapter. In the field, operators tend to use a unit to describe TSS. It is called apparent volumetric concentration. “Apparent volumetric concentration” is very common for reporting solid content of sludge streams.