Anaerobic digestion of olive mill wastewater in a periodic anaerobic baffled reactor (PABR) followed by further effluent purification via membrane separation technologies

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The combined treatment of olive mill wastewater (OMWW) by applying the anaerobic digestion process and further treatment in a system consisting of filters and membranes is presented. The anaerobic digestion of the OMWW took place in a high rate system, the periodic anaerobic baffled reactor (PABR). Application of the membrane system aimed at purifying the anaerobic effluent.

Anaerobic digestion of pulp and paper mill wastes – An overview of the developments and improvement opportunities

“…Xie et al (2010) [109] [111] observed about 90% COD removal during the steady period (22nd 33rd day) of the performance of a submerged AnMBR, treating thermomechanical pulping (TMP) whitewater. Several types of membranes such as PVDF based membranes [112], hollow polymeric fibers [113], ceramic tubular [114], etc. have been so far developed for the treatment of the various types of wastewaters.…”

“…As an example, a polymeric membrane based on sulfonated polycarbonate (SPC) and PVDF developed by Masuelli, Marchese, & Ochoa (2009) [112] resulted in lower fouling when treating an emulsified oily wastewater, as SPC content increased. Other types of membranes applied so far for the treat ment of a variety of effluents such hollow fiber for tofu processing waste [113] and ceramic tubular for olive mill wastewater [114], are among the applied membranes with external/side stream con figurations which can be also evaluated for the treatment of P&P mill effluents. Such a configuration can also provide benefits such as easer membrane replacement and providing high flux with more direct control of fouling [163].…”

Membrane reactors for biogas production and processing

“…However, the membrane surfaces of hydrophobic polymeric membranes can be modified to increase hydrophilicity (Sainbayar et al, 2001). Many studies on AnMBRs using tubular membrane modules have also been reported (Herrera-Robledo, Morgan-Sagastume, & Noyola, 2010;Pierkiel & Lanting, 2005;Stamatelatou, Kopsahelis, Blika, Paraskeva, & Lyberatos, 2009;Torres, Hemmelmann, Vergara, & Jeison, 2011;Zhang et al, 2007). Hollow fibers are popularly used in submerged MBRs because of their high packing density and cost efficiency.…”

“…Treatment of food processing wastewater containing a high concentration of starch and fat was investigated by He et al (2005) using an external cross-flow AnMBR equipped with four types of PES UF membranes with nominal molecular weight cutoff (MWCO) ranging from 20,000 to 70,000 Da. Furthermore, AnMBRs could be applied to treat a wide variety of feedstocks such as pulping whitewater (Gao, Lin, Leung, & Liao, 2010;Lin, Liao, et al, 2011), slaughterhouse waste (Siegrist, Hunziker, & Hofer, 2005), simulated petrochemical effluent (Van Zyl, Wentzel, Ekama, & Riedel, 2008), olive mill wastewater (Stamatelatou et al, 2009), brewery wastewater with surplus yeast (Torres et al, 2011), and kraft evaporator condensate (Lin et al, 2009. However, the removal rate dropped sharply at loading rates >4.5 kg/m 3 /d or HRT <50 h. Although the MWCO had a minor influence on the removal of SS, organic matter, and bacteria in the AnMBR system, the membrane with the largest MWCO exhibited the most severe flux decline.…”

Performance optimization of the Växtkraft biogas production plant

“…Some of the results of the study are shown in Table 2. In other studies on membrane filtration in connection with anaerobic digestion processes (for example [17][18][19][20][21]), the process performance is measured as the ability to clean waste water, while the focus in [16] instead is the ability to increase biogas production. The influence of temperature on the permeate flux is studied as well.…”