The Use of Bioreactors Coupled With Membranes for the Treatment of Effluents

Abstract

The objectives of this paper are to verify the viability of operating a bioreactor coupled with a membrane, and to analyze the global mechanisms witch need to be considered in the bioreactional concept in the separation by membrane. In order to meet the proposed objectives, a culture with a synthetic substratum (ethanol) was utilized. A mineral membrane with the following characteristics was used: a pore diameter of 0.2 <FONT FACE="Symbol">m</font> m, 19 channels of a 4 mm diameter, a width of 0.85 m, a filtering surface area of 0.2 m2, a pressure of 2 bar and a tangential velocity of 2 m/s. The experiments consisted of modifying the residence time of the substratum within the reactor. The following measurements were taken: chemical oxygen demand (COD), concentration of biomass and filtered flow. The results show a treated effluent of good quality, indicating that the time of hydraulic residence time influences the efficiency of the system and is influenced by the restriction of the filtered flow by a fast fouling of the membran