photo of an iron ehanced sand bench
Iron enhanced sand bench, Prior Lake, MN. Photo courtesy of Ross Bintner.

Main page for iron enhanced sand filter

Iron-enhanced sand filters are filtration best management practices (BMPs) that incorporate filtration engineered media mixed with iron. The iron removes several dissolved constituents, including phosphate ( dissolved phosphorus), from stormwater. Iron-enhanced sand filters may be particularly useful for achieving low phosphorus levels needed to improve nutrient impaired waters. Iron-enhanced sand filters could potentially include a wide range of filtration BMPs with the addition of iron; however, iron is not appropriate for all filtration practices due to the potential for iron loss or plugging in low oxygen or persistently inundated filtration practices. Here iron-enhanced filtration is limited to two types:

  • Iron-enhanced sand filter basin (analogous to surface sand or media filters)
  • Iron-enhanced sand bench in wet ponds

Iron-enhanced sand filters may be applied in the same manner as other filtration practices and are more suited to urban land use with high imperviousness and moderate solids loads. Iron-enhanced sand filters are more suitable to conditions with minimal groundwater intrusion or tailwater effects. Because the primary treatment mechanisms are filtration and chemical binding and not volume reduction, vegetating the filter is not needed and may impair the filter function. All of the iron-enhanced sand filters require underdrains that serve to convey filtered and treated stormwater and to aerate the filter bed between storms. The exit drain from the iron-enhanced sand filter should be exposed to the atmosphere and above downstream high water levels in order to keep the filter bed aerated.

Iron-enhanced sand filters may be used in a treatment sequence, as a stand-alone BMP, or as a retrofit. If an iron-enhanced sand filter basin is used as a stand-alone BMP, an overflow diversion is recommended to control the volume of water, or more specifically, the inundation period in the BMP. As with all filters, it is important to have inflow be relatively free of solids or to have a pretreatment practice in sequence.

This page (category) provides links to pages that provide information on iron enhanced sand filters.

This page was last edited on 12 February 2023, at 14:18.