FUNDAMENTAL INVESTIGATION ON CONSTRUCTED WETLAND DESIGN FOR WASTE WATER PURIFICATION

Abstract

In designing a constructed wetland for water purification, a homogeneous vegetation bed is often adopted in order to prevent short circuit which reduces the efficiency of SS trapping. However, vegetation naturally becomes inhomogeneous under the action of water flow, causing unexpected short circuit. This paper discusses a possibility to design a channel for a "stable short circuit", which distributes SS to vegetation zones by large horizontal eddies between the channel and vegetation zones. A series of numerical experiments show that even one slightly bended channel can distribute a high ratio of SS supplied through the channel to vegetation zones with the aid of horizontal eddies. This fact suggests that hydraulic design of artificial short circuit can be an alternative strategy for design of constructed wetlands.