Artificial Neural Network as a Virtual Sensor of Nitrate Nitrogen (V) Concentration in an Activated Sludge Reactor

The paper discusses the use of an artificial neural network to control the operation of wastewater treatment plants with activated sludge. The task of the neural network in this case is to calculate (predict) the readings of the probe measuring the concentration of nitrate nitrogen (V) in one of the biological reactor tanks. Neural networks are known for their ability to universal approximation of virtually any relationship, including the function of many variables, but the process of “training” the network requires the presentation of many sets of input data and corresponding expected results. This is a difficulty in the case of wastewater treatment plants, because some key process parameters are usually not measured online (samples are taken and measurements are taken in the laboratory), and even if they are, the time intervals are large. Bearing in mind the aforementioned difficulty, this work uses a set of input data consisting only of information that can be measured with measuring probes.

As a result of the conducted experiments a high compliance of the probe’s prediction with the expected values was obtained. The paper also presents data preparation and the network “training” process.

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