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Considering a membrane bioreactor for the treatment of vegetable oil refinery wastewaters at industrially relevant organic loading rates

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Abstract

The present study aims to shed more light on the use of membrane bioreactors (MBRs) for the treatment of vegetable oil refinery wastewaters (VORWs). A MBR was operated for 157 days in which it was fed with real VORW of varying composition at a range of organic loading rates (0.20 ± 0.05–3.79 ± 0.29 kg COD m−3 day−1). The hitherto unconsidered fate of VORW constituents through the biological process was followed using gas chromatography/mass spectrometry analysis. This analysis revealed that only 19% of the identified feed constituents remained in the MBR effluent whereas ten new compounds were formed. Linear correlation analysis attributed the effluent residual COD to soluble microbial products (SMP) and non-readily biodegradable recalcitrant oily compounds. Trend of change of MLSS, mixed liquor viscosity and SMP with increasing OLR suggested that when MBR is operated under industrial conditions for the VORW treatment, the mixed liquor fouling propensity potentially increases with increasing OLR in the range studied.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Iran National Science Foundation (INSF) [Grant number 93034669].

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Environmental Group, Department of Energy, Materials and Energy Research Center, P.O. Box 31787-316, Karaj, Iran

    Elham Abdollahzadeh Sharghi

  2. Department of Chemical Engineering, Amirkabir University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

    Azadeh Shourgashti & Babak Bonakdarpour

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  1. Elham Abdollahzadeh Sharghi
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  2. Azadeh Shourgashti
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  3. Babak Bonakdarpour
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Correspondence to Elham Abdollahzadeh Sharghi.

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Abdollahzadeh Sharghi, E., Shourgashti, A. & Bonakdarpour, B. Considering a membrane bioreactor for the treatment of vegetable oil refinery wastewaters at industrially relevant organic loading rates. Bioprocess Biosyst Eng 43, 981–995 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00449-020-02294-9

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