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Comparison between absorption and biological activity on the efficiency of the biotrickling filtration of gaseous streams containing ammonia

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Abstract

Polluted air streams can be purified using biological treatments such as biotrickling filtration, which is one of the most widely accepted techniques successfully tuned to treat a wide variety of exhausted gaseous streams coming from a series of industrial sectors such as food processing, flavor manufacturers, rendering, and composting. Since the degradation of a pollutant occurs at standard pressure and temperature, biotrickling filtration, whether compared with other more energy-demanding chemical-physical processes of abatement (such as scrubbing, catalytic oxidation, regenerative adsorption, incineration, advanced oxidation processes, etc.), represents a very high energy-efficient technology. Moreover, as an additional advantage, biodegradation offers the possibility of a complete mineralization of the polluting agents. In this work, biotrickling filtration has been considered in order to explore its efficiency with respect to the abatement of ammonia (which is a highly water-soluble compound). Moreover, a complete mathematical model has been developed in order to describe the dynamics of both absorption and biological activities which are the two dominant phenomena occurring into these systems. The results obtained in this work have shown that the absorption phenomenon is very important in order to define the global removal efficiency of ammonia from the gaseous stream (particularly, 44% of the ammonia is abated by water absorption). Moreover, it has been demonstrated (through the comparison between experimental results and theoretical simulations) that the action of bacteria, which enhance the rate of ammonia transfer to the liquid phase, can be modeled through a simple Michaelis-Menten relationship.

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Abbreviations

a :

Specific area, m2/m3

C :

Constant 1 in Michaelis-Menten Eq. (18), kmol/(m3 s)

c :

Molar concentration, kmol/m3

D :

Packing material diameter, m

G :

Gas flow rate, m3/s

H :

Henry’s constant, (kmol/(m3 s Pa) height, m

K :

Pressure Drop Factor, (m2 s)/kg global material transfer constant, kmol / (s m2 Pa)

k :

Material transfer constant, kmol / (s m2 Pa)

L :

Liquid flow rate, m3/s

P :

Pressure, Pa

R :

Ideal gas constant, J/(kmol K) absorption or biological reaction rate, kmol/(m3 s)

S :

Constant 2 in Michaelis-Menten Eq. (18), kmol/(m3 s)

T :

Temperature, K

t :

Time, s

V :

Volume, m3

v :

Velocity, m/s

x :

Horizontal direction

y :

Molar fraction in gaseous phase, − Transverse direction

z :

Vertical direction

AIR :

Referred to as the air pseudo-species

abs :

Referred to absorption

aq :

Referred to as the aqueous phase

atm :

Referred to the atmospheric pressure

bio :

Referred to biological activity

C :

Referred to the column height

eq :

Referred to the equilibrium conditions

free :

Referred to as the tap water

g :

Referred to as the gas phase

in :

Referred to inlet conditions

l :

Referred to as the liquid phase

lb :

Referred to as lbmol units

NH 3 :

Referred to as the ammonia species

z :

Along the vertical direction

+:

Referred to upper side of the right boundary

−:

Referred to lower side of the left boundary

ε :

External void fraction, −

μ :

Viscosity, Pa s

℘:

Material diffusivity, m2/s

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Acknowledgements

The authors wish to acknowledge AirClean (Rho, Milan, Italy) for its technical support and Anna Valente and Maria Chiara Acerno for their support in the experimental activities.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Science and High Technology, Università degli Studi dell’Insubria, Via G. B Vico 46, 21100, Varese, Italy

    Sabrina Copelli

  2. School of Industrial Engineering, University LIUC-Cattaneo, Corso Matteotti 22, I-21053, Castellanza, VA, Italy

    Massimo Raboni

  3. Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Piazza Leonardo da Vinci 32, 20133, Milan, Italy

    Marco Derudi & Giuseppe Nano

  4. Department of Theoretical and Applied Sciences, Università degli Studi dell’Insubria, Via Vico 46, I-21100, Varese, Italy

    Vincenzo Torretta

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  1. Sabrina Copelli
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  2. Massimo Raboni
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  3. Marco Derudi
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  4. Giuseppe Nano
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  5. Vincenzo Torretta
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Correspondence to Vincenzo Torretta.

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Responsible editor: Marcus Schulz

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Copelli, S., Raboni, M., Derudi, M. et al. Comparison between absorption and biological activity on the efficiency of the biotrickling filtration of gaseous streams containing ammonia. Environ Sci Pollut Res 24, 23207–23218 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-017-9968-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-017-9968-3

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