Acid thermal hydrolysis causes the smaller flocs to aggregate
(Table 4). This explains that the breakdown of flocs
caused by thermal hydrolysis is compensated by adding acid
(H
2
SO
), which is indicated in the results of acid treatment
(at ambient conditions) in Table 4. This illustrates that at
pH 3 the repulsive interactions and the resulting dissociation
constants are minimized as stated above.
4